Q&A with Corey Lee, Director of 'What You're Ready For'

Q&A with Corey Lee, Director of 'What You're Ready For'
ACA 2007 nominated short
‘What You’re Ready For’ is nominated and featured in the Alberta
Centennial Award section this year.

CIFF: Tell me about your past experience in the ACA’s and what you look forward to this year.

Corey Lee(CL):My last film, “The Perfection of the Moment”, the first in the Kilter Trilogy, played at the ACA screening last year. It was a great turn out in the lower theatre at the Uptown, and I enjoy viewing my work with an audience, to both see and feel their reactions. I like the idea of the event, a kind of best of Alberta shorts, not to exclude specific artists, but more to inspire a higher level of quality amongst filmmakers in this province. As much as I make films for myself, I make them to be seen, and I think that’s something all filmmakers need to keep in mind, especially if you want to create opportunities to make more films.

CIFF: You are involved in some local music projects including Anita Athavale’s
music video also in this year’s festival. How do you switch from filming a serious drama to creating a music video?

CL: I have a strong visual sense and would like to believe that I am fairly organized –meaning I do a great deal of prep before I go to camera - which I think is horribly important, so, in that way, it’s no different. I do like to involve the musician in the process as much as possible - because really it’s all about them, as the video is a promotional tool as much as it is a standalone work of film (or video). With my narrative film projects, the entire focus is on what I need to craft the story I want to tell, from performance to framing and camera movement, to art direction, editing and music. My approach to music video is similar in the necessity of a clear and single vision, but the goal has to be to create an innovative and interesting visual work that the musician is excited to have represent, not only his or her music and lyrics, but also who they are as an artist.

CIFF: Do you have any future films in the works?

CL: I’m currently writing the final film in the Kilter trilogy, In Translation, with the author, John Gould, which will likely shoot over the winter. I’m in post-production on a new short film, ClimaXXX: a love story, a mockumentary about two struggling adult filmmakers, while also carving out the structure of a television/web series, Fur Nation. I am constantly working on my feature stuff and have a few in various stages, including: the father son crime-drama, Of
Winds and Dragons, the revenge tale, Fixer, the coming of age drama, Wrecking Ball, the Lynchian road movie, All Things Not Forgotten, and a crazy cross Canada clone comedy, currently known as Imperfekt.

CIFF: Are you showing at any other film festivals this year?

CL: “What You’re Ready For” is just hitting the circuit this fall. Following its premiere at the Alberta Centennial screening at CIFF, it will play the Edmonton International Film Fest in early October. There are a bunch of other festivals, mostly happening in 2008, currently pending. With a bit of luck I’ll be enjoying some time on either the beach or the slopes while traveling with the film, so it should be an exciting run.

How did you get into filmmaking?
CL: I was into drawing and illustration from quite a young age and that evolved into writing fiction. Often I’d sit around for days on end writing these stories and then illustrating them. Later, I experimented with my father’s video camera, using my friends as actors and making little shorts. I left art college for film school, then worked as a technician for several years, which ended up being a wonderful opportunity to watch some incredibly talented directors, actors and cinematographers work.

What inspired you to adapt this story?
CL: There are so many great stories and wonderfully cinematic bits in John’s (Gould) “kilter: 55 fictions” collection, but “What You’re Ready For” hit me pretty early on. There is just such an exacting and precise wrath wrapped up in the obsessive psychosis of the Narrator’s ultra calm and sane exterior. And the collision course that he and Laird are on is so brilliantly laid out in the original story. I thought it would make a delightfully dark, sad and funny little film. A perfect second chapter in this trilogy based on his “kilter” stories.

What about the story do you identify with most?
CL: I love how we peel the layers off of these characters and ultimately expose their opportunistic choices, one character following the teachings of the other. We often paint our own reality in our mind... and it looks nothing like what’s really going on around us. Exposing that is what is really interesting to me.

Why do you think audiences are fascinated by stories about what people will do in the face of extreme emotion?
CL: That is when we are at our worst or maybe, our best. It’s a pure and primal
reaction, that’s what we love. It’s unfiltered. It’s how we wish we could live, most
of the time – without that worry of consequence or judgment. Moments of
extreme emotion become etched into our brains and affect us for the rest of our
lives. You watch your wife give birth to your first child. You see a pedestrian get hit at a crosswalk. An assailant points a gun at your head and demands money or your life. These are things that change you forever.

What influences you as a filmmaker and why?
CL: Life. Just living and examining what frightens me. Certainly having recently had a child brings out new reactions to the world and new fears, but I enjoy getting lost in things and then having to figure out where the hell I am and how I got there.


What does your film say about all those offering self-help advice and those who choose to seek it out?
CL: I love how John’s story holds Laird accountable. None of us live perfect error free lives, including these people who are offering advice. To preach one thing, then turn around and do the opposite, simply because in your own mind, you can
justify it, well, that is morally wrong. Some of us might need to be pointed in a better, more healthy direction and I don’t see anything wrong with seeking out that advice, but don’t think that whoever you’re looking to for guidance isn’t just as capable of screwing up as easily as you are. Look for the answers inside yourself first.


What’s the most extreme action you’ve ever taken in the name of love, hate or loss?
CL: When I was a kid, my Aunt who was, and maybe still is, obsessed with status and wealth, told me I shouldn’t be an artist because artists don’t make any money. I was pretty depressed for a while, then angry – like “Who the hell are you to tell me what I can or cannot be when I grow up.” If I was older, I probably would have just gone on a hell of a bender, but I was like 10. Anyway, shortly thereafter, I decided I wanted to make movies. Making a conscious choice to be a filmmaker, with all the risk, heartache and struggle that this profession seems to endlessly provide, I’d say that’s pretty extreme.


Joe Media Alberta Centennial Award
Uptown Downstairs
Sunday, September 23, 6:30pm

Guest Blogger: Kay Panabaker from 'Moondance Alexander'

Back to that whole "the people in Calgary are the best!" theme - this photo was taken when TJ Bews (who together with Kirk Jarrett owned and trained most of the horses in the film - and trained me!) had us over for dinner with his family - yep, that's where I want to retire!

Hi there! My name's Kay Panabaker and I play Moondance Alexander in the film called Moondance Alexander. For those of you who don't know me, I'm 17 and when I'm not acting I'm a history major at the University of California at Los Angeles. I've just started my senior year and when I graduate I hope to be a 4th or 5th grade teacher. Or I might want to do something that involves working with kids and animals, because I'm a really big animal lover.

For now, though, I'm enjoying my work as an actress. Last summer I went to Canada to shoot Moondance Alexander, and I was excited to go because I'd worked before in Canada and really liked the people. My very first job was in Vancouver and Victoria, on the west coast, and I'd visited Nova Scotia on the east coast, but this was somewhere I'd never been! I've visited all 50 states in the US, so now I'm thinking that I might have to try and visit all the provinces in Canada!Speaking of TJ and Kirk, that's the 3 of us getting ready to shoot the last scene of the film! I love how you can see forever from that hillside!

Alberta, Canada is BEAUTIFUL! When I was working up there, I kept telling everyone that I wanted to retire there. Half of the people told me not to wait until I retired (since that's going to be quite a while) and the other half reminded me that I hadn't spent a winter there yet, and it can get pretty cold! There was so much to see - rolling hills, beautiful sunsets (really late at night - like 9:30 - that was really strange!), mountains, a beautiful lake, incredible clouds against a blue, blue sky - I'm including some pictures so that you can see why I fell in love with the place.

We worked long days and I spent at least one day a weekend with the horses, so I didn't have a lot of free time, but I did get to see a little bit of the area. Although we flew into the Calgary airport, and I visited the Calgary Zoo and The Keg restaurant in Calgary (a must-do when we're in Canada!) we really spent all our time in smaller towns, like Okotoks (pronounced Oak-uh-toaks) where our hotel was, and High River where the production office was, and Longview where I spent my weekends riding. One weekend we drove up to the West Edmonton Mall, which is a HUGE indoor mall with 2 miniature golf courses, an IMAX theater, a skating rink, a penguin exhibit, an indoor waterpark, a seal and sea lion show - so much to do! (And Mary, who helped me with my outfits in the movie, sent me with bubble baths so that I could relax while we were there - isn't she the greatest?) Another time we drove over to the Lake Louise area of Banff National Park in the Canadian Rockies, which was beautiful.

So that's a little bit about me and about why I'm involved with the Calgary International Film Festival. I am SO EXCITED to be heading back! I had hoped to go back this summer to work as a ranch hand for TJ Bews, who worked with the horses on the film and taught me to ride, but first I had another movie come up and then I had school, so I never made it. To be able to go back to an area I LOVE, to share a movie that I LOVED making, and hopefully visit with some of the LOVELY people that I worked with on it? Priceless!

If you're reading this, I hope you'll make plans to come to the Calgary International Film Festival on Sunday, September 23 at 1PM to see Moondance Alexander screened at the Eau Claire Market Cineplex Odeon. I'll tell you more about the film itself later, but let me just say now that you won't believe the beautiful scenery in the movie - you'll get to see some of those rolling hills and beautiful sunsets that I thought were so awesome. I think it's a great advertisement for Calgary - after seeing this film people are going to say "That's beautiful! I want to go there!" I'm going to be there for the screening on September 23, I'm hoping that a lot of the people who worked on it will be there, and I'd love to meet you there, too!

This is Lake Louise in the Banff National Forest. What a view!

We were driving home from work one day, and the sunlight was streaming down through the clouds over this farmhouse in the distance, and I said what a great picture it was, so our driver Kim pulled over so I could take the picture - the people in Calgary are the best!

Letters From Litein by Matt Palmer

PDF Courtesy of Avenue Magazine www.avenuemagazine.ca

Watch for the Special Presentation of 'Letters from Litein'.
CANADA, 121 MIN.
Director: Matt Palmer Producers: Matt Palmer, Petros Danabassis, Kaari M. Autry Cinematographers: Lisa Fryklund, Courtney Forster, Matt Palmer Editor: Bridget Durnford Music: Dave Horrocks

“It takes a community to raise a child,” or so the saying goes. In Letters from Litein, a community of children from Fred Seymour Elementary School in Calgary, Alberta, reach out to a community of children at an orphanage in Litein, Kenya through the gift of song. This endeavour began with the school’s global citizenship initiative, and a fortuitous series of events led to a fundraising project entitled Keeping the Circle Strong, whereby students and their families raised funds through silent auctions, student presentations to corporate Calgary, and sales of a 15-track CD recorded with the children’s choir from an orphanage in Africa. The goal was to raise $50,000 for the orphanage and the children surpassed their goal.

Calgary filmmaker Matt Palmer (Paydirt) chronicled the children’s trip to Kenya and recorded their eye-opening experience. The film poignantly expresses how social barriers quickly evaporate through the universality of music. As the filmmaker noted, “This film is the story about the journey of a group of ordinary students, teachers, and parents who learned that what they give of themselves made a difference to people in Africa.”



For more information on the film and to read Matt Palmer's filmmaker blog click here, www.lettersfromlitein.com

Hands in your pockets....

ROCK POCKETS
Directed by Trevor Anderson

"Rock Pockets", winner of the inaugural Lindalee Tracey Award at the Hot Docs Canadian International Documenary Festival will be showing at the 2007 Calgary International Film Festival.
Synopsis: A sugar rush of sex, politics, and rock 'n' roll, as seen through the eyes of a ten-year-old boy at the fair. A short personal documentary disguised as meta-music video. Featuring appearances by members of Shout Out Out Out Out, The Wet Secrets, and the music of The Vertical Struts. (from www.dirtcityfilms.com)

Check out Trevor Anderson's past, present, and future projects at www.dirtcityfilms.com

STAY TUNED FOR SHOW TIMES AND MORE INFORMATION!

Also look out for an interview with the director, Trevor Anderson in the Fall Issue of Kitschykoo! Subcultural Lifestyle magazine.

New Interview with 2006 ACA* Winners, Kirsten and Devon Bolton!

Interview with the directors of the ACA* award-winning "Shipwrecked" and their international success since!

Calgary International Film Festival (CIFF): What did it feel like to win the ACA award in 2006?

Kirsten Bolton (KB): Calgary was the third festival we had screened at to date (preceded by our debut at The Rhode Island Film Festival and then The Atlantic Film Festival in Halifax). It was a little nerve racking because it was in front of a home audience, and the first time we had been in attendance to see it on a big screen. I remember we were worrying what the quality would look like blown up from video. Devon had just arrived from out of town and was really sick, and was going through quite a painful and stressful divorce at the time. So we were a little run down.

Hearing the applause of the audience was a rush, and just having it be well received in that way was rewarding. Because the making of the short had been so prolonged and difficult and almost didn’t get finished, going on to then win the ACA Award at the end of the night was a wonderful validation that our efforts had been worth it. It was that little punctuation and pick-me-up we needed, and the momentum kept us and the film moving forward.

We were also very happy that even though we shot the film in BC, it was still recognized as “Best Alberta Short.” We’re Alberta filmmakers, and it shouldn’t matter where a project is shot. It’s about empowering and supporting Alberta filmmakers to tell original stories, regardless of where they are set or shot.

CIFF: Describe your international success since winning the ACA award for Best Short Film at the Calgary International Film Festival in 2006.

KB: Since the 2006 Calgary Festival, Shipwrecked has gone on to be an Official Selection at over 23 international Festivals in Canada, US, Mexico, Australia, and New Zealand. Among those are five Academy-Award qualifying festivals, meaning if you win “Best Short” at one of them, you qualify to go on to be nominated for an Oscar. Hard to even fathom. We’ve come really close. Grrr! We won “2nd Place” at the Chicago International Children’s Film Festival, which is a biggie. But “2nd Place” doesn’t quite cut it! Devon was nominated for “Best Cinematography” at the Rhode Island Film Festival, which was awesome considering we shot on Mini-DV and were up against feature films. We recently won “Best Short Film” at the SPROCKETS Toronto International Film Festival. As a children’s festival, we were really proud that we were voted for this award by a jury of 8-12 year olds.

Some of the cities we’ve screened at include New York, Seattle, Chicago, Sydney Australia, Toronto, Atlanta, Nashville, Auckland New Zealand, Santa Barbara, Victoria, and Brooklyn. We’ve attended several of the festivals, but our highlight was a multi-stop trip that we took to present our film at The Sedona International Film Festival in Arizona, and then onto the Brooklyn Academy of Music’s Children’s Film Festival. Sedona was so beautiful and picturesque, and we attended to do Q&As with the audience. We were surprised to be presented with “Best Short Film” at the awards luncheon, and then were awarded a $5000 cash prize for excellence in filmmaking. Us and Sarah Polley’s “Away From Her” were the only Canadians to win one of these cash prizes. It was great. Paid for the trip! In Brooklyn, we did Q&As over two days with New York kids and Shipwrecked had a great reception there. We were mobbed after the screening by parents with questions and encouraging words, and kids wanting autographs. Very surreal, but it shows how universal film and stories can be.

That festival was important for us because it was just for kids, and it was fascinating for us to hear directly from them what they thought of the film and its message. The festival committee had had arguments about Shipwrecked and whether or not to accept it because the feeling was it might be too subtle for kids to get. Luckily, we had a champion on the board – the executive director from Chicago – and she convinced the board to screen Shipwrecked. Not only did the kids get it, they asked the best questions. Really smart. Really perceptive. It just proved to us there is a market out there for intelligent kids’ films that are more sophisticated and grown up.

Our other highlight, we’d have to say, is being contacted by the Museum of Modern Art in New York. They acquired Shipwrecked and will be screening it at the Museum in November. It’s a huge honour.

Even though we’re not actively still entering many festivals (they all cost money to enter and ship in DVD screeners, an exhibition copy, and publicity materials, so it gets expensive!) – we’re continually amazed to receive several emails almost every week from Festivals who have heard about Shipwrecked, or saw it at another festival and now want to invite it to theirs. We’ve been contacted by festivals as far away as Russia, Israel, Australia, and Tai Pei.

We’d still like to make an effort to enter some European festivals. Shipwrecked should do well. But that’s the thing about festivals, you never know. We win “Best Short” at some high profile festival, then don’t even get accepted to other festivals.

Read the rest of the article at the Calgary International Film Festival Facebook!
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*The Alberta Centennial Award was inaugurated in 2005 to commemorate the 100th anniversary of Alberta as a province, this award is for Best New Alberta Short Film. Recognizing Alberta’s filmmakers, locations, and stories, no matter what the content, the films reflect the diversity of style and approach that is expected from our complex and fascinating province.

Sachin Gandhi: Local Film Blogger Published in Hindustan Times

Sachin Gandhi, CIFF programming volunteer, cinema enthusiast, and avid blogger; has reached international readers when his captivating blog article, ‘Jhoom Story Jhoom; Sachin Gandhi on where movie music is going, going, gone’, got picked up this month by the Hindustan Times, an Indian newspaper.



Check out http://likhna.blogspot.com for more insight into Bollywood and other international films.

Welcome to the Calgary International Film Festival Blog!
Be sure to check here weekly for Canadian filmmaker interviews, exciting information about the upcoming festival, and interesting blog entries by some of Calgary’s film bloggers!

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