Telefilm Canada to fund the production of 12 English-language feature films for a total of more than $8 million

• Actor Jay Baruchel directs his debut feature with the sequel to the hit hockey comedy Goon.
• Projects featuring Canadian stars such as Donald Sutherland, Tatiana Maslany, Adam Beach and Jessica Paré.

Montreal, November 26, 2015 — Telefilm Canada is pleased to announce its support for 12 English-language films with a total investment of more than $8 million through its Canada Feature Film Fund. The projects selected for funding are Hunting Pignut (Martine Blue), Maudie (Aisling Walsh), nineteenseventysomething (Bruce McDonald), Goon: Last of the Enforcers (Jay Baruchel), Mean Dreams (Nathan Morlando), Milton’s Secret (Barnet Bain), Operation Insanity (Érik Canuel), The Other Half (Joey Klein), Juliana and the Medicine Fish (Jeremy Torrie), Loneliness of a Sewer Trucker (Hakan Sahin), Lovesick (Tyson Caron) and Entanglement (Jason James).

Telefilm’s most recent funding decisions for English-language films were announced on July 28th and October 6th, 2015.

Atlantic Region

Hunting Pignut*
Director: Martine Blue
Screenwriter: Martine Blue
Production: Pope Productions
Genre: Drama
Confirmed talent: Taylor Hickson, Joel Thomas Hynes
Release date: Fall 2016

Fifteen-year-old Bernice hates her life in tiny, isolated Black Gut, Newfoundland. She believes that she will never live down the traumatic childhood that left her deeply scarred. Bean, her mother, tries to be a friend but is busy struggling to get ahead. Self-centered, lonely, starved for attention and shunned by peers, Bernice makes up stories about hanging out with her dad, whom she hasn’t seen in 10 years. Her dejected spirit takes a strange turn when her dad dies of a heroin overdose and Pignut shows up for his wake. Bernice stumbles upon Pignut’s writing journal and becomes obsessed with discovering more about her father, his facial tattoo, his friend Pignut and their clan of nomadic gutter punks. When Pignut steals her father’s ashes from his urn, Bernice embarks on a hunt for the ashes and to discover her place in her father’s heart and in the world.

Maudie (majority coproduction with Ireland)
Director: Aisling Walsh
Screenwriter: Sherry White
Production: Small Shack Productions, Rink Rat Productions, Solo Productions, Parallel Film Productions, Landscape Films, Painted House Films, H Is4 Productions
Distribution: Mongrel Media
Genre: Romance
Confirmed talent: Sally Hawkins (Blue Jasmine, Happy-Go-Lucky), Ethan Hawke (Before Midnight, Boyhood)
Release date: 2016

Maudie is based on the true story of Everett and Maud Lewis, a reclusive fish peddler and his housekeeper, and Maud’s remarkable rise to international fame as a folk artist. Suffering from birth defects and crippling arthritis, Maud spends much of her childhood at home, where her mother teaches her to paint. After her parents die she lives with an aunt before going to work for Everett. They soon marry and Maud begins to cover the tiny, one-room house with colorful paintings. Even after worsening arthritis makes housework impossible, she steadily produces exuberant compositions for modest sale. Despite, or perhaps because of, all this, Everett, a hardened man who grew up an orphan and lives as an outcast, unexpectedly finds himself falling in love with the little, bright-eyed woman who sees nothing but color and beauty in the world.

nineteenseventysomething*
Director: Bruce McDonald (The Tracey Fragments)
Screenwriter: Daniel MacIvor
Production: Weirdos The Film
Genre: Drama
Confirmed talent: Dylan Authors, Julia Sarah Stone (2014 TIFF Rising Star), Allan Hawco (Republic of Doyle), Molly Parker (House of Cards)
Release date: 2016

Nova Scotia, 1976. It’s the weekend of the American Bicentennial and 15-year-old Kit is running away from home. Enlisting the help of his girlfriend, Alice, Kit hitchhikes through the stunning maritime landscape towards a new home with his glamorous, artistic mother, Laura. However, as Kit and Alice near their final destination they find their relationship tested as Kit approaches a realization that will change his life forever.

Ontario and Nunavut Region

Goon: Last of the Enforcers
Director: Jay Baruchel (Goon)
Screenwriters: Jay Baruchel, Jesse Chabot
Production: No Trace Camping, Caramel Films
Distribution: Entertainment One Films
Genre: Comedy
Confirmed talent: Jay Baruchel (Goon), Liev Schreiber (X-Men Origins: Wolverine), Alison Pill (Scott Pilgrim vs. the World), Seann William-Scott, Wyatt Russell, Kim Coates, Marc-André Grondin (C.R.A.Z.Y.)

After one too many concussions, hockey enforcer Doug Glatt (Seann William Scott) is forced to give up his aspirations of going to the big show and settle into a buttoned-down career as an insurance salesman at the urging of his pregnant wife, Eva (Alison Pill). However, Doug can’t resist the siren call of the Highlanders, so he sets course to reclaim his former glory.

Mean Dreams*
Director: Nathan Morlando (Edwin Boyd)
Screenwriters: Ryan Grassby, Kevin Coughlin
Production: Woods Entertainment
Distribution: Elevation Pictures
Genre: Thriller
Confirmed talent: Sophie Nélisse (The Book Thief, Monsieur Lazhar), Josh Wiggins, Kevin Durand, Colm Feore (Bon Cop, Bad Cop)

This coming-of-age thriller follows Casey and Jonas, two teenagers desperate to escape their broken and abusive homes. Stealing a bag full of drug money from Casey’s corrupt police officer father, they band together and are forced to con, fight and bribe their way to survival.

Milton’s Secret
Director: Barnet Bain
Screenwriters: Barnet Bain, Donald Martin, Sara B. Cooper
Production: Buck Productions, Riverside Entertainment, Hulo Films
Distribution: Momentum Pictures
Genre: Drama
Confirmed talent: Donald Sutherland (The Hunger Games), Michelle Rodriguez (The Fast and Furious), William Ainscough, Mia Kirshner, David Sutcliffe
Release date: 2016

Milton’s Secret is a coming-of-age story about a 12-year-old boy growing up in an economically depressed suburb and the eldering of his grandfather. His mother and father are workaholics with marital and financial problems, and he is being bullied at school. When his grandfather visits, Milton learns that rehashing the past and worrying about the future are preventing him from finding true happiness moment to moment.

Operation Insanity (Family Feature Production Fund project in collaboration with Corus Entertainment)
Director: Érik Canuel (Bon Cop, Bad Cop)
Screenwriter: Jeffrey Schechter
Production: CCI Entertainment
Distribution: Elevation Pictures
Genre: Action, comedy
Confirmed talent: James Caan (The Godfather), Dylan Everett (Degrassi: The Next Generation), Lou Gossett, Jr. (The Book of Negroes), Jessica Walter, Kenneth Welsh, Paul Sorvino, Lawrence Dane, Greta Oneiogo
Release date: 2016

Jake Bouchard, a shy 17-year-old, has finally scored a date with the incredibly wonderful Angie. There’s only one problem: he’s forgotten that his senile, paranoid grandpa is coming from the ‘home’ that night for his bi-monthly family dinner, and it’s Jake’s turn to drive Grandpa back afterwards. But while driving Grandpa back Jake gets a call. Angie’s car has broken down and she needs Jake to pick her up right away. When Jake and Grandpa arrive they find that Angie is gone. Grandpa gathers his old war buddies, The Devil’s Scum, to help save the girl of Jake’s dreams.

The Other Half*
Director: Joey Klein
Screenwriter: Joey Klein
Production: Motel Pictures, JoBro Productions & Film Finance
Distribution: Mongrel Media
Genre: Drama
Confirmed talent: Tatiana Maslany (Orphan Black), Tom Cullen (Downton Abbey), Suzanne Clément (Mommy), Henry Czerny, Mark Rendall, Deragh Campbell

A grief-stricken man and a bipolar woman fall in love and attempt to forge a simple life together.

Western Region

Juliana and the Medicine Fish*
Director: Jeremy Torrie
Screenwriters: Jeremy Torrie, Jake MacDonald
Production: High Definition Pictures
Genre: Drama
Distribution: Bandwidth Digital Releasing
Confirmed talent: Adam Beach (Flags of Our Fathers, Arctic Air), Emma Tremblay, Roseanne Supernault

After the sudden death of her mother, 12-year-old Juliana is forced to repair a difficult relationship with her seemingly indifferent, introverted inventor father and the impending bankruptcy of the family business: a 50-year-old fishing lodge on majestic Lake of the Woods. In a last-ditch attempt to save the lodge, dad organizes a desperate, high-stakes fishing derby with a $1-million prize for any record species caught. Powerless to help until she finds a legendary musky lurking in the waters around the lodge, Juliana devises a plan to capture it and save the business. But when Juliana seeks the counsel of an old Ojibway fishing guide she learns this musky is an ancient ‘medicine fish’ with a spirit-essence crucial to the survival of the lake, and all other muskies.

Will young Juliana capture the mythic beast and save the lodge, or will she allow it to live? What medicine does this magical musky hold?

Loneliness of a Sewer Trucker*
Director: Hakan Sahin
Screenwriter: Hakan Sahin
Production: Zamata Films
Genre: Drama
Release date: Fall 2016

Set in a remote oilfield hamlet cut off from the modern world, one man’s journey from childhood to old age is seen through an offbeat story where past, present and future all exist at the same time.

Lovesick*
Director: Tyson Caron
Screenwriter: Tyson Caron
Production: Eagle Vision
Genre: Romantic comedy
Distribution: Entertainment One Films
Confirmed talent: Jacob Tierney (The Trotsky), Jessica Paré (Mad Men), Jay Baruchel (Goon), Ali Tataryn, Rebecca Gibson

Dash (Tierney) has nothing figured out. He’s 33, broke, depressed and still in love with his ex, Lauren (Paré). Dash’s world explodes when Lauren gets engaged to a man she barely knows Mark Adam Jones (Baruchel). Life looks pretty hopeless until he meets Nora van Denbrock (Tataryn), a spontaneous, unforgettable woman. However, timing is everything, and Nora is not the type of woman who is going to wait around for Dash to figure out his life.

Entanglement*
Director: Jason James (That Burning Feeling)
Screenwriter: Jason Filiatrault
Production: Entanglement Pictures
Genre: Romantic comedy
Confirmed talent: Thomas Middleditch, Jess Weixler, Diana Bang

While searching for the meaning of his existence, Ben Levin uncovers a family secret that leads him to a woman named Hanna… who might have almost been his adopted sister. But when he and Hanna inadvertently fall in love, and his life becomes increasingly and strangely complicated, Ben starts to realize that everything is amazingly and incredibly connected – and that the world might just be more inexplicable than he ever imagined.

*Lower-budget feature films

About Telefilm Canada—Inspired by talent. Viewed everywhere.
Created in 1967, Telefilm is dedicated to the cultural, commercial and industrial success of Canada’s audiovisual industry. Through its various funding and promotion programs, Telefilm supports dynamic companies and creative talent here at home and around the world. Telefilm also makes recommendations regarding the certification of audiovisual treaty coproductions to the Minister of Canadian Heritage and Official Languages, and administers the programs of the Canada Media Fund and the Talent Fund, a private donation initiative. Visit telefilm.ca and follow us on Twitter at twitter.com/telefilm_canada and on Facebook at www.facebook.com/telefilmcanada.

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Media enquiries:
Françoise Lapointe, Advisor, External Communications, Telefilm Canada
(514) 283-0838, ext. 2028, or 1-800-567-0890
francoise.lapointe@telefilm.ca

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