Some say your 40s are your best decade, because you have – hopefully – achieved a certain level of success and you proceed with wisdom. Well, the same might be said of Deluxe Toronto, which in March will turn the big four-oh (including its film lab’s previous incarnation as Filmhouse).

Finale launches Nitris suite

The National Association of Broadcasters is the annual powwow of free, over-the-air U.S. ‘casters, but it is just as renowned for its trade show, reputedly the world’s largest electronic audio/video media exhibition. Now, starting with NAB2004 in Las Vegas, the show will give post-production professionals pointers on how to ring those bells and blow those whistles on the newest pieces of gear on display.

What started in 1999 as a conversation between a Canadian and an Italian producer over dinner in Milan, has grown into one of the largest films Alberta has ever seen, complete with major international investment and high-profile stars, including Andy Garcia and Angela Bassett.
Calgary producer Bruce Harvey of Illusions Entertainment is in the final stages of production on The Lazarus Child, a $32-million dramatic feature directed by Graham Theakston (The Politician’s Wife).

Montreal: Dimension Films, the genre division of Hollywood powerhouse Miramax Films and distributor of the Scary Movie and Spy Kids franchises, has signed a deal with Go Films producer Nicole Robert to acquire remake rights to the Eric Tessier thriller Sur le seuil.
Distributed by Alliance Atlantis Vivafilm, which also has world sales rights, the original Sur le seuil (Evil Woods in English) pulled in $486,000 on 70 screens, ranking number one at the Quebec box office over its Oct. 3-5 opening weekend. As of Oct. 26, the film had receipts of over $1.5 million, tops among homegrown thrillers, surpassing Jean-Marc Vallee’s La Liste noire, which took in close to $1.2 million.

If they play their cards right, George Bloomfield and his friends could make their next movie – Mozart Loves Me, a feature film worth about $5 million – for half price.
The romantic comedy is the first project to be undertaken by The Movie Co-op, a new production outfit that formed last month in Toronto – bringing together a who’s who of Canuck filmmaking talent in a joint effort to make commercial movies on the cheap. Cast, crew and suppliers are providing their services to the shoot for free, in return for shares of the co-op.

This year’s edition of MIPCOM was characterized by a notable increase in commercial activity and a positive mood – partly a reflection of improved financial and advertising markets, and the lack of identifiable, overwhelming world crises.

Let’s be honest about this. An American in Canada proved this paper (and, cough, this reporter) wrong by making it to a second season. When it failed to get LFP cash from the Canadian Television Fund back in April, the little-seen six-ep series looked as if it would soon go, like so many similarly cash-strapped shows, off to the mountainous ash heap of Canadian sitcoms. The future of the show was, as we put it, ‘uncertain.’
But – who’d a thunk it? – American went on to cheat death all spring,

Vancouver/Toronto agency Palmer Jarvis DDB has spun its Cannes Silver Lion-winning Canadian Hockey Association spots from last year – the acclaimed ‘Relax, It’s Only a Game’ campaign – into a literal hat trick of hockey clients. In addition to the CHA, PJ has taken on the business of USA Hockey (the minor league equivalent of the CHA in the U.S.) and NHL.com, shooting spots for all three over the Thanksgiving weekend in Toronto.

After the worst 24 months for Canadian commercial production in decades, everyone is feeling the crunch and, if you believe every rumor you hear, just about every shop is going out of business.

A winner-take-all showdown is looming at the CBC between the two unions that currently represent its non-supervising and management employees outside of Quebec and Moncton, NB.

The winners of the best drama and comedy series awards at the 18th annual Gemini Awards were both surprises. One is a first-time winner, the other garnered its sixth such prize.
The Eleventh Hour, the Alliance Atlantis/CTV drama about the goings-on behind the scenes at an investigative news program, usurped the best drama honors from cop show Da Vinci’s Inquest, which won the award the past four years running.

Vancouver: At press time, Lions Gate Entertainment appeared close to finally sealing a deal with Artisan Entertainment, after a two-year courtship.

Telefilm Canada has released its 2002/03 annual report, boasting that its ‘end-to-end support for cultural products, from script to international marketing,’ totaled $239 million in financial commitments. Telefilm’s 2001/02 fiscal saw the agency commit $208 million.

McKenna fills in for Asper