Final Breath takes its first breath tonight.
The all-Prince George short-film, written and entirely shot in the local area, will be shown for the first time tonight at a big-screen event at the P.G. Playhouse. It's the lead show in a festival of short-films all created by local directors.
Final Breath will then go online where it will vie for the grand prize in the StoryHive short-film competition for Western Canada. The writer-director of Final Breath stands to win a professional development package for a first place result, which has positive implications for the entire film industry for this region.
"I'm excited to see all the other finalists in the competition with Final Breath," said the film's primary creator Kim Feragen who conceived of it after some spooky incidents in her youth on her family farm stuck in her mind over the years. "Each film is going to be unique and ours is the only one to be filmed in the north, so right there it will already stand out. And I wonder how many other entries will have a full musical score. We worked hard on having soundtrack music, which does a lot to a film. The audience almost doesn't notice that, until it's not there."
She was advised to add the musical elements by Norm Coyne, a more experienced Prince George filmmaker she turned to for guidance. Final Breath was her first go at moving pictures, an evolution of her primary career as a still-photographer. Coyne had collaborated in the past with performer-composer Jer Breaks, and Breaks agreed to come on board for Final Breath as well.
All the cast and crew were sourced from the local area. It took weeks of casting calls to arrive at the team of actors, some of them youths, and just as much work to find sound technicians, set preparation personnel, costume and prop people, camera operators, etc. Feragen said she was overwhelmed by the level of interest and the depth of commitment shown by the team that came together.
"The hardest part, no doubt, was all the standing around for hours out in the cold," Feragen said. "It rained a little bit, that wasn't too bad, but it was a chilly three days and there was wind, so everyone got cold and there wasn't much we could do about it. I couldn't believe how positive everyone involved stayed. The cast and crew had an amazing attitude. Everyone wanted to do their best to make the film the best it could be, so that made everything enjoyable. The story has a particular kind of mood, and for the most part I think we succeeded at getting the atmosphere we were all trying for."
It's a horror story, but not a gruesome slasher film. It's a moody, spooky skin-tingler. The StoryHive competition prescribed that all the entries be appropriate for a mainstream television audience, so Feragen ensured there was no overt violence but plenty of dark "theatre of the mind" mental engagement.
"It had a tight time limit, the StoryHive competition rules, so it's nonstop action for 10 minutes," she said. "We have eight hours of footage, so the hardest part was cutting it down to fit. We are focused on the competition right now but there is already some talk of a much longer version later, since we have this material."
They also have material for a behind-the-scenes special feature and a sizable blooper reel. These will be shown tonight at the Final Breath Film Festival, along with the works of Prince George auteurs Jon Chuby, Dan Stark and Chad Magnant.
They are proof positive that a local film industry is already underway, and the principal instigators are keen to support each other. Winning the StoryHive online voting competition would radiate across the whole burgeoning sector, since the grand prize isn't cash, it is high-level equipment and mentorship for future filmmaking.
Coyne is involved in making the next film in the region, a Stephen King story entitled The Doctor's Case primarily initiated and produced by one of Barkerville Historic Town's senior managers James Douglas. Feragen has also been brought in as a co-producer on that project to add that much more experience to her career.
"It's like a bouncing ball. First there's Final Breath, that has led to The Doctor's Case, and if we won the StoryHive grand prize imagine what more we could do after that," she said. "We had no way of imagining how this would all turn out, it has already exceeded all our expectations, and it has been such a constructive thing for so many people, not just me or a handful of people interested in directing, this is having a big ripple effect across the community. It's the beginning days of a new industry for our city. I want to see that really get a boost."
Tickets to see the Final Breath Film Festival can be purchased in advance ($11) at One Board Shop in Pine Centre Mall, or at the P.G. Playhouse door while supplies last. The shows begin at 7 p.m.
To vote for Final Breath in the StoryHive competition, log onto the StoryHive website and vote once per day - per personal device - during the polling period.
