Ivan Reitman’s first visit to Nova Scotia since he immigrated in 1951 and took his first steps on Canadian soil at Halifax’s Pier 21, was certainly the buzz of the 24th Atlantic Film Festival, especially after the veteran Canadian comedy director/producer announced his plans to work on a feature with local heroes the Trailer Park Boys.

Atom Egoyan and Hussein Amarshi raised the curtain on a shared, 10-year project earlier this month with the debut of Camera, a combination bar and movie house that, it is hoped, will put bums on seats and on barstools by screening non-commercial films for thirsty cinephiles. The 52-seat venue, located in an increasingly trendy west Toronto neighborhood, opened this month with a screening of the new art-house pic I, Claudia.

* Hans Fraikin is the new director of Telefilm Canada’s European office in Paris. For the past eight years, Fraikin held positions at Twentieth Century Fox International, at its Jakarta, Indonesia and Paris offices.

Knightscove, Random Harvest ink feature deal

Sandra Richmond is a partner in the Toronto law firm of McMillan Binch LLP and a member of the firm’s KNOWlaw Group. This article was written with the assistance of Melissa McBean.

Next year’s Genie Awards may be a tighter race. In response to an online poll asking ‘What will be the Barbarian Invasions of this year’s festival season,’ Saint Ralph was the narrow winner, getting 24.1% of votes. Being Julia was a close second at 22%, followed by Childstar (18.4%), Wilby Wonderful (12.1%) and Elles etaient cinq (9.9%). 13.5% of respondents thought none of these was on par with Arcand’s opus, voting ‘c’est impossible!’

This Hour Has 22 Minutes is produced by Michael Donovan and Alliance Atlantis Communications, but Donovan’s newly launched Halifax Film Company is not involved, as reported in the Sept. 13 issue of Playback.

There are certain things one should never do while angry, such as drive a car, drink, enlist in the army, or write open letters to city newspapers. This is doubly true if one happens to be the head of a film festival that is caught up in a battle for public and professional opinion with its financial backers.

Vancouver: Force Four Entertainment begins three weeks of production in the farmlands of Abbotsford, BC Oct. 14 on the CBC MOW A Love Story before moving production in November to Chandigarh in the Indian province of Punjab for two more weeks.
The $3.7-million production, which is also known as Murder Unveiled and will likely go through another name change, is a tragic Punjabi love story inspired by actual headlines.

Dead heads

Mainframe goes live

Toronto has had some experience starring as the site of a mysterious and lethal epidemic, so much of what plays out in the first two episodes of ReGenesis will seem very familiar to anyone who was near this city, or near a television, during the SARS outbreak.