'I'm Yours' actors Gregory 'Dominic' Odjig and Rossif Sutherland chat before the cast and crew premiere of 'I'm Yours' at the Royal Theatre in Toronto. Photo by Kate Adams.
'I'm Yours' actors Gregory 'Dominic' Odjig and Rossif Sutherland chat before the cast and crew premiere of 'I'm Yours' at the Royal Theatre in Toronto. Photo by Kate Adams.
The film 'I'm Yours' recently premiered at TIFF 2011 and opened the Cinefest Sudbury Festival, playing in packed theaters throughout the circuit. The movie, by New Real Films, highlights the beauty that is Northern Ontario and shot primarily in the North Bay area.
Billed as a comedic romance, it parallels the life changing effects of falling in love with the idea that a flock of geese could trigger a nuclear war from NORAD headquarters, situated in North Bay, Ontario, Canada.
'I'm Yours' writer and director Leonard Farlinger (Collateral Damage, The Perfect Son) who grew up partly in North Bay, gives insight into the film's creation and says that it started out as an idea that pits a romantic comedy against a perpetually threatening world.
“The idea of situating it in North Bay was there because NORAD headquarters was there and it always struck me as funny and ironic that fate of humanity was to be determined by North Bay.”
“So that, juxtaposed against the romantic story that's both kind of funny and touching always seemed really interesting to me,” he explains.
The film takes the viewer on an adventure with the main characters, Robert and Daphne, played by Rossif Sutherland (The Con Artist, Poor Boys Game) and Karine Vanesse (Polytechnique, Pan Am) taking a fateful journey up the scenic highways throughout Northern Ontario.
Shot of the course of 15 days at the beginning of November 2010, Farlinger says he felt that they got lucky with good weather, assisting them in making a film that documents a feel of the region that is original and never before seen.
“This part of the world (Northern Ontario) has a unique character that, until you capture it on film, is assumed as mundane to the residents here. To viewers in Europe and the United States, these locals have an exotic type nature that we take for granted.”
Producers, Mallary Davenport, Avi Federgreen and Jennifer Jonas, say they used film to give a crisp, clean look to the picture but still gave a gritty yet real traction on how these characters would have felt here in the North. The film isn't afraid of the Northern Ontario clichés either, while accurate, it manages to somehow capture the magic someone first experiences with them.
Actress Karine Vanesse gives a fiendishly spirited performance while still endearing herself to the audience. Being the cute yet sensual French Canadian that she is, she concocts a performance that truly holds the movie together and stands up well to her co-star, Rossif Sutherland.
Sutherland, a somewhat undervalued but quickly rising and better known Canadian talent, gives a solid performance and shows that he is more than capable at the big screen level. His acting is reserved and believable and his emotions, while often understated, suit his character perfectly while his handsome good looks certainly entertain the female audience.
Noticeably as well is the performance given by a young actress in the movie, Ella Jonas Farlinger, who is indeed the director's daughter. Her acting is has translated into a role in “My babysitter's a Vampire,” a kid's television show produced in Toronto.
Actor Rossif Sutherland took a private moment out from the festival to speak with BayToday.
He says that the long awaited script felt like it was a story that he could tell and that his character could be one that he could relate to on some levels.
“The rest I had to discover for myself but it was a journey that I wanted to go on,” he says.
Although the cast and crew were excited to be making the film, Sutherland says that the three week shoot on location was a whirlwind experience.
“We knew that we were embarking on an adventure,” he says.
“We just didn't know what was going to come next and everybody was so passionate that a real sense of closeness just seemed to happen.”
“It's a lovely way to make movies because you turn into a family,” says Sutherland.
North Bayites play background roles that are sprinkled throughout the movie so don't be surprised if that somebody in the back of the shot that looks familiar it probably is just who you thought it was.
The scenes, shot at local establishments, are full of all sorts of interesting characters and the movie really hits upon that nature of people to have another deeper or darker side, balancing their outward personality. The film plays upon shadow aspects of the character's personalities brewing to the surface while the love story salaciously intertwines them.
Farlinger, who has family in North Bay, says that he loved filming in the city for the way it looks and for the “sweet small town that it is.”
He says everybody was fabulous in terms of how great the city was to the cast and crew while filming.
“It was like we were an anomalous hit and we were something happening in the town that was very different so we were treated extremely well,” says Farlinger. “We'd go back in a flash.”
“I'd come back and work here anytime,” adds Sutherland.
The motion picture will be debuting to the North Bay audience in a few weeks. Make sure that you get a chance to see this wonderfully picturesque film.
