GIMLI, MB — The chair of the Gimli Film Festival, Senator Janis Johnson, hopes that one day her expanding summer event on the shores of Lake Winnipeg will be regarded as a mini-Sundance Film Festival.

‘That’s always been my dream,’ Johnson told Playback Daily from the bustling GFF office just steps away from the resort town’s waterfront. ‘We are unique. We are in a rural area and we showcase independent films from Manitoba and Canada that many people wouldn’t have a chance to see otherwise,’ says the senator for Winnipeg-Interlake.

Originally settled by Icelanders, the Manitoba town is the largest community of its kind in North America. The festival, which runs Friday to Tuesday, began in 2000 to commemorate the arrival of Erik the Red at L’Anse aux Meadows in Newfoundland a millennium ago, and initially screened films by Icelandic-Canadian and Icelandic directors.

Now heading into its eighth year, the GFF has evolved into an eclectic mix of Manitoba independent films, mainstream documentaries and features from the chilly countries that circle the Arctic pole.

‘Our budget this year has tripled,’ says festival director Kristine Sigurdson. ‘And we expect to double our attendance by 2010.’

Although Sigurdson wouldn’t reveal how much it costs to run the festival, GFF’s main sponsors, which include Canwest, are increasingly supportive. Canwest hands out awards for short films, and company executive director David Asper is hosting the festival’s first VIP party.

Filmmaker/actor Paul Gross and producer Liz Jarvis (The Stone Angel) will participate in a panel on financing and marketing films in the 21st century, and there will also be a public interview with Guy Maddin entitled ‘Inside Guy’s Mind.’

Two extensive short programs — My Canada, Eh? and Winnipeg Saga — showcase dozens of original works by local filmmakers such as Kerry Barber’s My Indian Bum, Matthew Holm’s Man of the Northwest, and Maddin’s Odin’s Shield Maiden.

Maddin, who spends summers here, made the town famous on the art house circuit with his 1988 cult film Tales from the Gimli Hospital, and is on the fest’s board of directors. The director also inspired one of the GFF’s most unique features: movies on the beach. Supported by a steel scaffold mounted temporarily in Lake Winnipeg’s hard sandy bottom, a 35-foot screen rises out of the expanse of water.

‘I originally thought it would be fun to have the screen mounted on a boat or something, but that’s probably too complicated,’ says Maddin. ‘But there’s nothing like watching a film on the beach in Gimli. Especially as the moon rises above the lake and a bug flies up your nostril.’

Over 5,000 people are expected to attend the festival.