The Elmira Case - Canadian Premiere at Grand River Film Festival!

We're thrilled to announce that our short documentary THE ELMIRA CASE is making it's Canadian premiere at Grand River Film Festival!  We love that this local story which still making waves internationally years later, is premiering within the community that started it all.

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THE ELMIRA CASE will be screening on Wednesday, November 4th at 7:00pm together with the winner of the Best Canadian Feature Documentary at HotDocs, Haida Gwaii: On The Edge Of The World (dir. Charles Wilkinson)

The Volunteer DVDs & Blu-Rays have arrived!

Post by Rosco Films.

Seems incredible that 28 days of shooting principal photography, followed by three months editing a rough cut, followed by four months editing to picture lock, followed by six months of false starts with sound editing, followed by six months of score composition, followed by a month of sound editing, all comes down to a little round disk that is 12cm in diameter and 1.2mm thick!

Initially we were planning on releasing only HD digital downloads but you, our fans, wanted hard copies so we are delivering hard copies!

DVDs are $20CAD + tax ($22 cash)
Blu-Rays are $25CAD + tax ($28 cash).

*Twenty percent of your purchase will go to our friends at Ray of Hope who help those struggling with crime, addiction, or homelessness! They know well both the joys and frustrations of the 'volunteer' spirit.

There are a number of special features included in the DVD/Blu-Rays:
- feature-length commentary
- behind-the-scenes reel
- previously unreleased short film VANCOUVER which plays as a bit of a prequel to THE VOLUNTEER both in terms of story and production.

Email us or reach out on facebook to buy yours today! If do not live in Waterloo Region, please buy your copy at our online store so we can ship it to you!

Thanks again for all of your support!

Cinéfest Sudbury Dispatch #3: THE VOLUNTEER World Premiere!!

Finally!! The premiere of THE VOLUNTEER! It's hard to believe that two years after shooting and three years after writing the story, we finally unveiled it to our first public audience!

It was weird standing outside the theatre and hearing the ushers directing customers - "You're here for The Volunteer? Number Four to your right."

It was like, "Really? But... you don't even know us!"

The experience was nerve-wracking but rewarding and my mind went back to this horrific experience by now-revered director, Wes Anderson, on the first screening of his first movie, BOTTLE ROCKET (1996). Unlike poor Wes, most of our audience stuck around to the end and gave us a nice hand.

Managing Director Patrick O'Hearn was, once again, wonderful in facilitating a great Q&A where everybody got to get up in front and say some words about their role and experience rehearsing and shooting. Amazingly, nobody said the words, "It turned me off filmmaking forever." A few key cast members were missing - Theodore Bouloukos and Cheryl Lee - we missed you!

Finally, we leave you with the kind words of a woman who raised her hand during the Q&A:

"I don't really have a question; I just wanted to say you guys knocked it out of the park! It was beautiful and wonderful and I want to watch everything you make."

UPDATE:
Andrew Cherry, Dave Walpole, and I went to the gala that evening (there's a gala every evening, free booze and food! Live music! What's not to like?) and there we got the real heart of the Cinéfest experience. We were recognized and people were coming up to us, to take pictures with us, telling us they loved our movie! It was fantastic and weird!

The demographic at Cinéfest skews 60yrs+ and many of them had been dedicated Cinéfest-goers for 26 years, since the beginning. A number of people told us they watch easily 30 or more films over the nine-day festival. One woman told me, "We're a town of workers, and we really appreciate the work you guys do to make films." There's a reason why Cinéfest bills itself "the people's festival". The folks here are hard-core cinephiles who not only appreciate the art, but the enormous amount of WORK that goes into making that art.

THE VOLUNTEER Official Trailer!

As we were about to post this on our facebook page, we had a little moment:

"Holy crap. This is actually the very first time people are actually seeing what we've spent two years crafting. I am scared."

Not scared so much as suddenly nervous! It's all good to show beautiful screen caps and behind the scenes photos, but to show everything put together?? And this is just the trailer!

Anyway, we hope you enjoy this - so many people put so much work into this over the past two years that it's rewarding just to have finished it and to say "WE MADE A REAL MOVIE."