Four months ago, Karen Thorne-Stone assumed the newly created post of Toronto film commissioner. As the city’s former executive director for economic development, she was no stranger to the production industry’s lead role in the municipal economy, but nonetheless she was charged with some formidable challenges. Chief among them was finding a way to rejuvenate a production center that had been perhaps the hottest spot for offshore Hollywood production at the beginning of the decade, but which had faded considerably due to increased competition from within Canada and around the world.

The face of Toronto’s Port Lands will soon be quite different.

Kelly Rowan (The O.C., Eight Days to Live) stars as a Mormon fundamentalist who flees a polygamous community in the CTV MOW In God’s Country. The movie, produced by Shaftesbury Films, wrapped in July after shooting around Ontario in Toronto, Hamilton, Ancaster and Dundas. Desperate Housewives’ Richard Burgi (left) and ReGenesis’ Peter Outerbridge also star.

After a slow start out the gate, HD production is picking up steam in Canada.

There are HD cameras now available to suit most production genres and budgets, and with HD broadcasting ramping up, it’s a format all TV producers will have to embrace sooner rather than later. Some top feature film directors such as George Lucas and Michael Mann have also already done so.

There was a time not long ago when the cost of shooting HD was prohibitive to some producers. But Showtime’s series Masters of Horror is demonstrating that you can shoot TV drama on an HD camera that costs $7,000 – in this case, the Panasonic AG-HVX200 HD camcorder.

According to director of photography Michael Marshall, the biggest challenge in shooting HD is in the lighting.

Alliance Atlantis has brought out the big guns to conquer the two solitudes with its bilingual buddy cop movie Bon Cop, Bad Cop – with marketing campaigns totaling some $1 million in place for Quebec and the rest of Canada.

Bell Globemedia’s out-of-the-blue takeover bid for CHUM may be bad news for staffers at the latter’s TV and radio stations, and for those concerned about the concentration of ownership in the news media – but it could also lead to extra funding in the neighborhood of $170 million for independent producers, depending on the CRTC’s math.

In a major and sudden shakeup at Alliance Atlantis’ Motion Picture Distribution, chairman Victor Loewy and CEO Patrice Théroux have left the company.

‘We are currently reviewing the strategic importance of the Motion Picture Distribution business and as promised, we will report back when this review has been concluded,’ said Phyllis Yaffe, Alliance Atlantis Communications’ CEO, in a statement.

The most sought-after launching point for Canadian movies is again proving to be a diverse draw, as the Toronto International Film Festival revealed on July 18 a lineup of homegrowns stocked with zombies, an Inuit shaman and the Rwandan genocide.

Temple Street Productions – producer of CHUM’s Canada’s Next Top Model and the Showcase comedy Billable Hours – will change hands on July 27 as its heads of dramatic production, David Fortier and Ivan Schneeberg, acquire the Toronto prodco from principals Patrick Whitley and Sheila Hockin.