With Industry Minister Allan Rock officially calling for a review on foreign investment restrictions in the telecom sector late last year, the lines are being drawn for what could prove to be a long, fierce battle within Canada’s media sector.

The following is an alphabetical listing of Canadian animation houses. Information is based on questionnaires completed by companies which chose to respond to Playback’s survey.

Montreal: Shooting is underway in Quebec City on director Robert Lepage’s fifth feature, La Face cachee de la lune, adapted from his critically acclaimed stage play. The film shoots in HD format over 20-plus days through to the end of the month, with additional dates scheduled in early March.

If you just can’t say no to a movie billed as ‘three stories of yearning and loneliness’ you will surely tune in to The Movie Network and Movie Central in March for Three and a Half, the latest of several downbeat films in the works at Toronto’s Summer Pictures.

Cautious optimism is the mood of the moment, as studios and film commissions plan for 2003.

Internationally recognized performers continued to figure prominently in Canadian feature film coproductions shot in 2002.

Michael Mosca might well be last year’s upstart genius of Canadian distribution. Or just plain lucky.

Distributors that traditionally peddle low-budget films will likely be paying more heed than usual to marketing their product in the wake of the success experienced in 2002 by the $5-million My Big Fat Greek Wedding.

19 Months, a high-definition romantic comedy produced at the Canadian Film Centre, was screened on three occasions at the recent VIFF. I screened it twice and noted variations in presentation that detracted from the hard work and effort invested in the production.

Despite having worked with some big-name Hollywood directors, director of photography Jan Kiesser is still Canadian enough to respect the peer recognition and overall importance of a Genie Award nomination.

Few businesses make a move, or spend so much as a single, devalued Canadian dollar, without the research to back it up. And not just any research – but the kind of down-to-the-molecular-level analysis known only to MBAs and UN weapons inspectors. New products are run past focus groups and checked against buying patterns, education, income, sex and, sometimes, sexual preference. Consumers are polled by phone and cornered in malls by platoons of clipboard-wielding marketers because no CEO, under any circumstances, however daring, wants to lose millions by introducing the next New Coke. Or by passing on the next Seinfeld.
The only exception? Why, Canadian television of course, an industry that, traditionally, has not been big on testing out ideas before they hit the air.

Montreal: The CTV Signature Drama presentation Choice is the story of Dr. Henry Morgentaler, one of the most controversial figures in contemporary Canadian history. Filmed on location over 20 days in Montreal to mid-December, the film chronicles Morgentaler’s stormy personal life amid the struggle to change the country’s abortion laws.
Many admire the still-spry 79-year-old doctor, and on one cold December day of filming, several of the 120 extras on set are lining up to shake his hand.