Vancouver: The West Coast’s enterprising guerilla filmmakers are back at their resourceful best with the production of Lucky Stars (aka Pick of the Litter), the first feature for producers Jump Communications and Like Minded Media.
Written by the producer/director team of Maureen Prentice and Jason Margolis, Lucky Stars is a digital video romantic comedy about a publicist who, after being dumped by her lover, gets a dog and tries to get him into the movie business.
The $100,000 feature stars Josephine Jacob (Madchen Madchen), Brendan Fletcher (The Law of Enlosures), Sara Walker (Housekeeping), Elisabeth Rosen (Murder in a Small Town), Damon Johnson (The Last Stop), Stanley Katz (MVP), Ray Galletti (I Spy), Mackenzie Gray (The Net), Peter Chinkoda (MTV Real World: The Lost Years), Michael Scholar Jr. (Street Cents), Prentice and her canine Lucky.

Deepa Mehta’s Canadian musical/comedy Bollywood/Hollywood opened Oct. 27 with a weekend take of $306,000, representing an impressive $8,700-per-screen average.

Vancouver: The Nov. 1 appointment of a new B.C. film commissioner by the B.C. Ministry of Competition, Science and Enterprise suggests that longstanding plans to maximize efficiencies by amalgamating marketer BC Film Commission with funder British Columbia Film have lost to the status quo.

Vancouver: Leaders at Vancouver’s largest production support unions are recommending members ratify new three-year master collective agreements that are expected to contain costs and make Vancouver more competitive for producers.

By year-end, almost 600,000 Canadian households will have HDTVs, with that number doubling in each of the next four years.

Vancouver: The Canadian broadcasting sector has found admirers in its American counterparts, who are watching from afar as we grapple with consolidation through multiple platform ownership and forge a digital network universe.
‘The Canadian marketplace is the envy of the U.S.,’ says David Bank, a New York-based director of equity research for RBC Capital Markets, who presented to delegates of the Canadian Association of Broadcasters’ 76th annual convention in Vancouver, Oct. 20-22.
Convergence, through common ownership of advertising-supported media – such as television, newspapers and billboards – and the ability to cross-sell to end-users and subscribers, is a goal coveted by U.S. companies, even though results to date are under-whelming.

Vancouver: More screenings meant a 10% increase in movie attendance at the 2002 Vancouver International Film Festival, which wrapped Oct. 11.

Vancouver: The WB Network has commissioned a pilot and six one-hours of The Black Sash, a mid-season replacement series by Tollin/Robbins Productions.
In the drama, a former cop falsely accused and incarcerated in Hong Kong returns to the U.S. and becomes a martial arts instructor by day and a bounty hunter by night. It stars Russell Wong (Romeo Must Die), Ray J (Moesha), and Canadians Corey Sevier (A Wilderness Station) and Sarah Carter (Trapped).
Production runs Nov. 4 to Jan. 24.

Vancouver: Canadian films will have to be commercially, rather than culturally, successful if they expect to meet government policy objectives to increase their share of domestic box office from 2% to 5% by 2006, says Canadian Heritage Minister Shelia Copps.

Vancouver: Attendance was up 18% at Vancouver International Film Festival’s 17th annual Film and Television Trade Forum, which ran Sept. 25-28 including the popular New Filmmaker’s Day.

Vancouver: Vancouver native Alex Vendler, cinematographer for the British documentary Kurt and Courtney, returns home for The Delicate Art of Parking, a drama/mockumentary by Anagram Pictures, makers of Mile Zero.
As the feature debut for director Trent Carlson (who directed the 1997 short film Groomed), The Delicate Art of Parking is about an idealistic parking enforcement officer whose devotion to his job is challenged by a motor vehicle accident that leaves his mentor in a coma.
At press time, only actor Dov Tiefenbach (Between Strangers, Flower and Garnet), who plays a documentary filmmaker trailing the hero, was signed on.
The $1.3-million budget – through Telefilm Canada, British Columbia Film, Movie Central and The Movie Network – allows for 20 days of production beginning Oct. 28.

Just weeks into her new job as president and CEO at the Canadian Television Fund, Sandra Macdonald has inherited a growing organization that is being buffeted by external industry changes that are affecting drama and documentary investment.
As evidenced in the CTF’s annual report for fiscal 2002 (ended March 31), released this month, documentaries are surging, while drama volume is waning. For instance, in fiscal 1998, drama hours trailed documentaries by 36%. In fiscal 2002, documentaries generated 1,121 hours, nearly double drama’s 624 hours.
The impact of the recently licensed specialties and their need for information programming, along with the difficulties in developing and financing drama, accounts for the ‘differentiation’ in demand, says Macdonald, adding that, as a reflection of the current industry, there is little the CTF can do about how its $241 million is dispersed.