Toronto’s Chesler/Perlmutter Productions is in production in Toronto on three animal-themed theatrical features. Coproduced with Germany’s Apollo Media and the U.K.’s Grosvenor Park under the banner Animal Tales Productions, the films – Touching Wild Horses, Time of the Wolf and Cybermutt – are budgeted between $4.5 million and $5 million each. As their titles suggest, all three tales involve animals, which the producers feel gives them universal appeal.

Touching Wild Horses began shooting Oct. 31 and will continue until Nov. 30. According to Lewis Chesler, C/P co-chairman/producer, the film is about ‘a young boy in great emotional pain who is sent to live with a woman who has deeply rooted problems of her own.’

After the two save a herd of wild horses, ‘both, in essence, find each other and find themselves,’ says Chesler. ‘It is a very powerful and emotional drama, and we are very pleased to be doing this kind of material now because it is a time when people need reassurance.’

Eleanore Lindo (Life in a Day) is directing the script from Murray McRae (Olive). Jane Seymour (Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman) stars.

Time of the Wolf, directed by Roderick Purdy (Cold Squad, Total Recall), is another coming-of-age story about a child who copes with the loss of his parents through an encounter with a pack of wolves that teaches him about the nature of loss and grief.

The screenplay, based on the novel by Thomas A. MacDonald, was penned by first-time feature screenwriter Don French. The film shoots Nov. 19 to Dec. 14.

Cybermutt, shooting Nov. 19 to Dec. 10, is about a scientist and a boy who team up to create a wonder-dog. The film is written by Kevin Commins (associate producer on Killer Deal, Lost Souls) and directed by George Miller (Andre, Neverending Story II).

All three projects are produced by Chesler, David Perlmutter and Paco Alvarez, with Apollo’s Frank Huebner executive producing.

Perlmutter says the producers expect to receive additional funding from both federal and provincial tax credits.

The three-pack will be delivered in spring 2002. Distribution is being handled by Remstar in Canada and Constellation in the U.S. Foreign sales are being handled through Ellipse, a unit of Canal+ in France.

Steel City is Expecting big production slate

Steel City Productions has a number of buns in its collective oven, the most immediate being the feature Expecting. According to Steel City CEO/producer Kirk Johnson, the film is one of three projects in the works at the Toronto prodco.

Expecting, a coproduction between Steel City and Toronto companies Perch Lake Pictures and start-up Forty-two Entertainment, is somewhat of a departure from the comedy-action projects like Blind and Marker that Steel City has produced in the past.

The film is about home birthing and is written and directed by Deborah Day (Blind). Valerie Buhagiar (Highway 61) and Colin Mochrie (Blackfly) star. Perch Lake’s Tom Walden and Forty-two’s Sharon Petzold are producing with Johnson and Steel City partner Michael Cameron.

Johnson says casting Buhagiar in a film about pregnancy was serendipitous. ‘We didn’t know it at the time, but she really was pregnant; we cast her because we thought she was amazing,’ says Johnson. ‘That worked really well. The whole pregnancy actually added to it.’

Expecting is budgeted at just under $1 million, with funding from Telefilm Canada, private investors and licences from Showcase and Movie Central. Johnson plans to seek out a distributor after a film festival run next year.

Steel City has two additional projects in the works, both in the early stages of development.

First up is the comedy feature Standup Guys, about a pack of standup comedians who try to rob a bank. Cameron is writing the script and might also direct.

The second project, Marker, is another brainchild of Cameron’s. The calling-card short piqued interest at The Movie Network and is now being developed as an original series for TMN, with funding from Astral Media.

The 13-episode, one-hour series follows two female mercenaries. ‘Imagine Betty and Veronica with guns,’ says Johnson. ‘It is not totally dramatic, nor is it totally comedic. It has some fun elements….I do like the ‘Sex in the City meets The Sopranos’ tag [coined by a TMN executive]. It’s not their job that gives them the heartache. It’s the real world, which is too complicated for them to figure out.’

Projecting a $1-million per episode budget, Johnson says Steel City is actively looking for an international coproduction partner for Marker.

‘We’ve been very strategic, but we are ready to rock ‘n’ roll because all the pieces are falling into place,’ he says.

AAC’s AKA

Shooting wrapped this month on the MOW a.k.a. Albert Walker, a Canada/U.K. copro between Toronto’s Alliance Atlantis Communications and London-based Little Bird. The two-hour thriller for CTV and BBC One is in post and is expected to air sometime in 2002.

Shot at various locations in England, a.k.a. Albert Walker is the story of an investigator assigned to the case of Ronald Peck, whose body is found caught in a fishing trawler’s net. What follows during the investigation is a mystery involving assumed identities, missing money and murder.

London-based Sophie Gardiner and AAC senior VP of television production, Anne Marie La Traverse, are the producers. Little Bird’s Jonathan Cavendish is executive producer.

The project was written by Philip Palmer and helmed by Lord of the Flies director Harry Hook. It stars John Gordon-Sinclair (Gregory’s Two Girls), Sarah Manninen (Live Through This) and Alan Scarfe (Seven Days).

Budgeted at approximately $5.5 million, the MOW received investment from the Canadian Television Fund, the Cogeco Program Development Fund, and both federal and provincial tax credits. It is produced in association with the Isle of Man Film Commission. AAC has world rights.

Canadian Ralph Brunjes is editing the film in London.