IFCO PRESENTS:
REEL REBELS!

ANNUAL GALA SCREENING 2010

When: Saturday, March, 20th at 7:00PM
Where: National Library & Archives of Canada (395 Wellington Street @ Bay Street)
What: Reel Films by Reel Filmmakers!

The Independent Filmmakers Co-operative of Ottawa Inc. (IFCO) is eighteen, and ready to break free from conventionality; IFCO's filmmakers are rebelling against the norm with a new batch of exciting short films. IFCO has supported eighteen years of excellent independent cinematic expression in the National Capital Region, and on Saturday, March 20th, Ottawans are invited to experience Ottawa's REEL REBELS, as the Co-operative showcases new film works from its incredibly talented filmmakers.

In a milieu where many local independent producers are almost solely working with digital modes of production; the Independent Filmmakers Co-operative of Ottawa Inc. (IFCO) dares to defy the 'norm', encouraging and inspiring local artists to create celluloid based works; films which emphasize creative filmic approaches & processes; films which reflect the individual filmmaker's personal vision, and films which don't necessarily conform to any one definitive cinematic genre or style.

This year's Gala Première will provide the local audience with an opportunity to engage in a truly alternative viewing experience. So, mark off Saturday, March 20th on your calendars, and come out to support Ottawa's REEL REBELS and their new crop of short films.

Tickets are $12 and can be purchased in advance at IFCO's office now - (Ste.140 - 2 Daly Avenue). You can also purchase tickets at the door.

Join us for a post-screening party at D'Arcy McGees (44 Sparks St. at Elgin - downstairs), where you'll have a great opportunity to mix 'n' mingle with the filmmakers.

For more information please contact:

Telephone: (613) 569-1789
E-mail: director@ifco.ca

BIG THANKS TO OUR EVENT SPONSORS!

Filmmaker: Deniz Berkin
Title: Ghost Hunter's Strangest Case
Production Format: Super-8mm/Black & White & Colour
Finishing & Exhibition Format:   Digital
Running Time: 5:00 minutes/13 seconds

Filmmaker: Matthew Clark
Title: Baka 2 
Production Format: Super-8mm/Colour
Finishing/Exhibition Format: Digital
Running Time: 1:00 minute/37 seconds

Synopsis:
A short film about how you should not trust anyone out in the forest.

Filmmaker: Pixie Cram
Title: Prometheus in Five Directions
Production Format:  16mm/Colour
Finishing/Exhibition Format :  Digital
Running Time: 14:00 minutes/48 seconds

Synopsis:
A cybernetic re-telling of the myth of Prometheus.  Prometheus created humankind, and then stole fire from the gods to give to the humans.  In the film, a woman lives alone in a remote farmhouse.  At night, shadows appear on the wall of her bedroom.  During the day, a bird, reminiscent of the vulture from the myth, delivers warning messages to her doorstep.

Director's Bio:
Cram, a native of Ottawa, holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree from Concordia University (1999).  Her films span live-action narrative, music video, and stop-animation formats.  Her work has shown at festivals across Canada and internationally.  Pixie is a founding member of the Windows Collective, a film installation collective that formed in Ottawa in 2008. Her website is:  www.artengine.ca/pixiecram.

Filmmaker: Marianne Corriveau
Title: Sideways Eight
Production Format: 16mm/Black & White
Finishing & Exhibition Format:   Digital
Running Time: 3:00 minutes/18 seconds

Synopsis:
In a metaphor about the different stages of life and death, Angle Huit – Sideways Eight follows two mimes on their journey through birth, companionship, and loneliness.  Soon after the film starts, the Girl Mime gives birth to a companion, the Boy Mime, who joins her into existence. But as the game of life follows its course, a latent threat casts a shadow over their joy. As the film reaches its climax, the two are eventually separated by Death, impersonated by the colour white. The Girl Mime remains alone again, with only a memory to keep her company. The characters are neither children, nor adults, but rather serve as anonymous reflections of bilateral interactions between genders, over the course of their accelerated lifetime.

Director’s Bio:
Marianne Corriveau is a young and dynamic Ottawa indie filmmaker. She has been a member of the Independent Filmmakers Co-operative of Ottawa Inc. (IFCO) for several years and has now produced and directed a few short films.  Her works include primarily experimental narratives that make extensive use of visual metaphors.  She likes to explore the world of non-linear story-telling to find out what effects different visual and sound elements can have on the way a narrative is told and interpreted. Her filmography includes “Angle Huit – Sideways Eight” [2nd version] (2009), “Pour papa avec amour” (2009 and “The Eternal Fight of Thirst” (2006) which all have been screened at various IFCO events. Ms. Corriveau is currently in pre-production of a 15 minute short entitled “The Museum of Arts”.  Using a very suggestive approach, this film will examine the relationship between art and society, and the consequences of the public and institutional neglect of artistic expression.

Filmmaker: Sara Tedford Gold
Title: It’s A Living
Production Format: 16mm/ Colour
Finishing/Exhibition Format: 16mm/ Colour
Running Time: 9:00 minutes

Synopsis:
While Inuit art is often positioned as quintessentially Northern, of the North, it is also urban and, for the urban Inuit artist, it is a living. In this short film, the filmmakers provide a brief glimpse into the daily work of an urban Inuit carver.   Images of carving and rock-hounding are contrasted with the towering presence of Inuit art in the nation’s capital.

Directors’ Bios:
Sara Tedford Gold is a new filmmaker and a sociologist with a background in community-based research, particularly with capacity building in northern and Inuit communities.  Her filmmaking grows out of her interest in local voices, citizenship and photo-voice techniques.  She is a full-time mom living with her husband and two children in Ottawa.  Her work has taken her to many Inuit and Arctic communities over the past ten years.

Pitseolalaq Moss-Davies is from Qikiqtarjuaq, Nunavut and lives in Ottawa.  A full-time mom, Pitsey is also a research coordinator with Inuit Circumpolar Council (Canada).  She has worked with Inuit non-governmental organizations, including the Inuit Art Foundation, for 11 years.  Inspired by the talent and vision of her brother, Idris Moss-Davies and mother, Jeela Moss-Davies, Pitsey carves for pleasure.  This is their first collaboration and marks the beginning of a vision.

Filmmaker:  Paul Gordon
Title: Footpaths and Shortcuts
Production Format: Super-8mm/Colour
Finishing & Exhibition Format:   Digital
Running Time: 7:00 minutes/23 seconds

Synopsis:  
"A cross between a H.P. Lovecraft short story and a Bill Mason canoeing film".

Filmmaker: Patrice James
Title: Ghost (Jost)
Production Format: Super-8mm/Colour
Finishing/Exhibition Format: Digital
Running Time: 5:00 minutes/28 seconds

Synopsis:
They say you never forget your first time...hmmm!  Ghost (Jost) is about a woman, her passport and a first adventure; take a trip with me and discover a magical place.

Director's Bio:
Patrice has been an IFCO member since 1999 and IFCO’s Executive Director since 2006.  She holds a Bachelors of Arts Degree in Film Studies from Carleton University, and is herself a practicing media artist; her credits to date include Flava Sistas Flava (2004), Black In Ottawa (2009), Ba Bye Mammy Ba Bye (2009) and Black Like She (2009).

Filmmaker: Mike Kerr
Title: Modern Violence
Production Format: 16mm & Super-8mm/Black & White 
Finishing & Exhibition Format:   Digital
Running Time: 4:00 minutes/31 seconds

Synopsis: 
Modern Violence is an experimental narrative about a man falling asleep at the wheel of his car and the strange occurrences that happen after an accident.

Filmmaker: Penny McCann
Title: Lot 22, Concession 5
Production Format: 16mm/Colour
Finishing/Exhibition Format: Digital
Running Time: 3:00 minutes/57 seconds

Synopsis:
Hand-processed 16mm film imagery, tinted, toned, and transformed, is combined with memory fragments of a rural past to create a visual poem about family, place, and time.  Filmed at Philip Hoffman's Independent Imaging Retreat in Mount Forest, Ontario in 2008, with sound design by Edmund Eagan.

Lot 22, Concession 5 forms one chapter, in a larger project entitled In Between (remembering and forgetting) to be completed in 2010.  The title refers to the lot and concession number of my great-grandfather's farm in Westport, Ontario, as recorded in the 1911 census.  The voice is a fragment of the past, taken from an old recording of my father, Leonard McCann, who passed away in 1992.

Director's Bio:
Penny McCann's body of work spans two decades and encompasses both dramatic and experimental films and videos. Her narrative works: The Sisters (1993); The Fires of Joanna (1998); Helpless (2001), and The Professor and the Blind Girl (2009), involve stories from the past told in highly codified ways.  Her experimental works include Marshlands (2000), 02.02.02. (2003), Away for Christmas (2004), and Lake Ontario (in my head) (2006) and form an ongoing investigation into hybrid forms of expression, mixing film and video imagery to create shifts in subjectivity, memory, and perspective.  Her films and videos have been broadcast widely and exhibited at festivals and galleries throughout Canada and internationally in Europe, Asia, and the United States.  Lot 22, Concession 5 will have its international première at the International Short Film Festival Oberhausen (Germany) later on this year.  Penny is currently employed as Director of SAW Video.

Filmmaker: Matt Mitchell
Title: "Lost in the Fine Print"
Production Format: 16mm/Colour
Finishing & Exhibition Format:   Digital
Running Time: 14:00 minutes/47 seconds


Synopsis:
“Lost in the Fine Print” is about Drew, a shy peculiar man who has no luck with women. Rejected and defeated, he gets a new job at an office where he develops a relationship with the office printer. It starts talking to him through printout messages, and after overcoming his own fears and suspicions, he begins talking back to it. They hit it off despite his overbearing boss and voluptuous secretary doubting his sanity. Through a series of coincidences and malfunctions, Drew is transformed after a confrontation with his own counterpart and pursues what he knows he truly desires.

Director’s Bio:
Matt Mitchell was born in Tokyo, Japan, and grew up in Victoria, British Columbia and Ottawa. He is eighteen years old, and is presently enrolled in Ryerson University’s School of Image Arts. Since the age of twelve, Matt has had a keen interest in the art of filmmaking and its ability to tell stories in countless ways. He started his creative practice by partnering with his schools in Victoria and Ottawa to organize screenings of local, youth --- produced films. He then went on to produce and direct three short films of his own, each premiering successfully in Ottawa at various venues to sizable audiences.

Since then, Matt has been consistently making fiction films of his own, as well as locally commissioned videos for film festivals, sports teams, businesses, and the Royal Canadian
Mounted Police.  During the summer of 2008 at age sixteen, Matt wrote the script for “Lost
In the Fine Print”. Upon funding from two Ottawa --- based media art organizations,

Filmmaker: Jeff Parenteau
Title: Paris Istanbul
Production Format: Super -8mm/Colour/Black &White
Finishing/Exhibition Format: Digital
Running Time: 9:00 minutes/21 seconds

Synopsis:
A series of super 8 images taken while traveling in Paris and Istanbul in 2008.

Filmmaker: Jeff Parenteau
Title: Enough - Music Video
Production format: Super-8mm/Colour
Finishing/Exhibition Format: Digital
Running Time: 4:00 minutes/39 seconds

Synopsis:
The first official music video for the band "The Habit" from Ottawa, Canada. The video is for the song titled "Enough" from their album "Safe House".

Director's bio:
Jeff Parenteau is an independent filmmaker from Ottawa. He is obsessed with Super-8.  Dave Croucher is a gypsy currently living in Ottawa, but calls Mount Pearl home, where he is known as "Paco".

Filmmaker: Tasha Waldron
Title: Bashment Ting
Production Format: Super-8mm/Colour
Finishing/Exhibition Format: Digital
Running Time: 3:00 minutes/17 seconds

Synopsis:
From Night Club to Fight Club… Girls gone wild in a rub a dub style!  This is what happens when New Years turns into a real 'BASH'.

Director's Bio:
Tasha has been an IFCO member since April 2006, and has been IFCO’s Membership Coordinator since February 2007.  She is a graduate of Algonquin College’s Scriptwriting Program, a former member of Saw Video's Board of Directors (2006-2009) and also teaches various media art workshops and freelances.  Tasha is herself an emerging media artist; she is passionate about directing, writing and editing. Her credits to date include dramatic shorts, and experimental films including Freestylz (2006), The Art of Deception (2007), Naptime (2007), Lust In Love (2007) and La Petite Mort (2009); her work has been both broadcast, and exhibited at various festivals and screenings.