Montreal’s film festival woes continue to send ripples of trouble right across the country, first in Halifax and, more recently, at home, where Claude Chamberlan, director and founder of the Festival du nouveau cinéma Montréal, up and left after more than 30 years with the festival.
Chamberlan’s departure, resulting from a conflict with the festival’s new general director André Lamy, has baffled observers and sent another tremor through the city’s already shaky festival scene.

An application for a new English-language pay television service is putting the spotlight on competition and the CRTC’s pay-TV policies.

A new wing of the Toronto International Film Festival is looking to give Canuck filmmakers a leg up on the international scene by providing year-round help with marketing, networking and talent searches.

Year two for the Broadcaster Envelopes initiative at the Canadian Television Fund shows, in a final tally, $129.5 million has been allocated to independent producers by Canada’s French- and English-language broadcasters in 2005 – the lion’s share going to the French market, where 21 broadcasters divvied up $68.9 million, or 53%, among children’s, documentaries, drama and variety programs.

Gatineau, QC: More than 300 Quebec producers, distributors and broadcasters met here for the APFTQ’s annual convention April 26-27, where the emphasis was on maximizing the potential of international markets.

Vancouver: The Collector, a sophomore series for CHUM shot in Vancouver by No Equal Entertainment, collected another 30 Leo Award nominations for 2005 – set to be celebrated May 27 and 28 – upping substantially the record-setting 21 nods from last year.

Halifax: As always, the annual study of movie-going dollars and demographics by consultant Howard Lichtman was the must-see slide show of ShowCanada. Must see and don’t blink, that is, because he talked at auctioneer speed for almost a full hour.
Bottom line? The Canadian box-office take was up less than 1% in Canada last year to $952 million according to the 500-page thinkpiece assembled by his Toronto-based Lightning Group.

Halifax: It was hard to get away from Ricky, Julian and Bubbles at this year’s ShowCanada. Time and again, there they were. Around every corner, at every podium. Holding a press conference, introducing a highlight reel or smoking out behind the hotel – the boys of Trailer Park Boys were front and center to pre-hype their soon-to-shoot movie.

The Hot Sheet tracks Canadian box-office results for the period April 22-28 and television ratings for the period April 25 – May 1.

The 12th annual Hot Docs, April 22 to May 1, marked the Toronto doc fest’s biggest and busiest year to date. Audiences grew, delegate numbers were up and, with documentaries becoming a hotter commodity for broadcasters and theatrical distributors internationally, market events were busier than ever.

The National Film Board took the opportunity of Hot Docs to announce a pair of international initiatives, including a new prize at the Cannes Film Festival dedicated to animated shorts pioneer Norman McLaren.

Canada’s place as a producer of feature film documentaries dominated talk at the second annual Doc Policy Summit, held April 25 in Toronto in conjunction with Hot Docs.