Toronto: Emerging from development and financial limbo, newly reformed Noble House Entertainment is gearing up for what looks to be an ambitious production cycle – shooting four to six features over the next 24 months, while at the same time distancing itself from the (Hmm, how to put this delicately?) direct-to-video pedigree of its principals.
The company is led by Damian Lee, a been-around-the-block producer of some 20 films stretching back 20 years, including Captured with Dolph Lundgren, the last of the five Death Wishes, and 1996’s Electra with Shannon Tweed.

Capri in gear for Villeneuve feature

Busy summer for B.C.

Vancouver: On March 16, Vancouver’s Paperny Films sent a cut of the one-hour $250,000 Discovery Health special Thirst for Life to the Canadian Television Fund – hoping that the project would actually get the $50,000 in funding promised from the CTF in 2004.
Like other documentary projects that have fallen under strict scrutiny from the CTF, the Paperny project, about the health benefits of red wine, may not get its funding after all.

New Saskatoon doc shop starts with drama

Winnipeg: For many in Manitoba, winter is a slow, cold season, but for Winnipeg’s Frantic Films, it has been busier than ever. The company’s live-action division currently has a feature and three doc series in post, and its doc/reality series Last Chance for Romance is now airing on Global.
Before Jamie Brown joined the company as CEO and executive producer in 2000, Frantic was focused on local, primarily commercial, animation and had eight full-time employees. Today the company has 70 full-time staff and has completed visual effects work for features including X2,

‘I just knew that it had potential to be a great cult film,’ says Toronto director of photography D. Gregor Hagey of the quirky sci-fi comedy feature Phil the Alien.

CSC announces nominees

There might still be a dearth of Canadian drama on TV screens, but it’s not for lack of effort on the producers’ side, at least if the volume of recent applications for the Cogeco Program Development Fund is any indication.

The Canadian Television Fund won’t be alone in awaiting federal renewal next year – each of the funders launched via the Canada Feature Film Fund in 2000 will either expire or be revived in 2006. Still, the need to campaign for renewal, to educate members of Parliament and cabinet ministers on the importance of preserving all the CFFF’s small but mighty offspring is a first of sorts for the Canadian Independent Film and Video Fund.

Sitcoms and dramas are set for an upswing in the 2005/06 season, following the springtime wave of broadcaster orders to the Canadian Television Fund that, pending approval, will bring back ratings winners such as Dominic Da Vinci and Brent LeRoy, while also making room for new titles from the likes of Howard Busgang and Teresa Pavlinek.

It has been busier than usual these past few weeks at the Canadian Television Fund. The March 1 deadline was looming, bringing in reams of paperwork from across the country and, on Feb. 14, an unflattering piece in The Globe and Mail touched a raw nerve about documentaries and Canadian content, sending fund boss Sandra Macdonald and her board of directors into full-on damage control mode.