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BIG READ: VIFF Favourite BECOMING REDWOOD Opens at International Village Today

Published April12, 2013 on Vancouver is Awesome

Jesse James Miller’s feature film Becoming Redwood is rooted in some of his own experiences: his love of golf which led him to turn pro at the age of 19 and hero-worship Jack Nicklaus’s six green-jacket wins at The Masters golf tournament; his hippie father’s flight to Canada as a conscientious objector to the Vietnam War; and the shuttle back and forth between his parents after their divorce. But Miller never dreamed as a young boy that his parents would reunite if he beat Jack Nicklaus at The Masters, as 10-year-old Redwood Forest Hanson (Ryan Grantham) does in the Vancouver writer-director’s endearing film.

Becoming Redwood opens in Vancouver today at the Cineplex International Village, one day after the 77th Masters got underway in Augusta, Georgia, with the legendary Jack Nicklaus. who’s won the tournament more than any other golfer, as an honourary starter.

The Story: In 1969, two-year-old Redwood watches helpless from the backseat of a Volkswagen van as his mother Jade (Miller’s wife Jennifer Copping) leaves his draft-dodging father Ethan (Chad Willett) at the Canadian border. Eight years later, his  father is arrested for dope dealing in B.C. and golf-obsessed long-haired Redwood (Ryan Grantham) must return to the U.S. to  live with his mother, her two teen sons (Tyler Johnson and Todd Potter), her red-neck husband Arnold (Derek Hamilton) and Arnold’s basement-dwelling elderly father Earl (Scott Hylands) in northern California. How to deal with all this trauma? Redwood imagines beating the “Golden Bear”, aka  Jack Nicklaus, at the Masters will solve all his problems. Or as the movie’s poster puts it: When the Going Gets Tough, the Tough Turn Pro.

Becoming Redwood production still – Courtesy of Jesse James Miller

Becoming Redwood production still – courtesy of Jesse James Miller

Read More »BIG READ: VIFF Favourite BECOMING REDWOOD Opens at International Village Today

WEEK: March 11-17, 2013

  • Sunday, March 17th – Red Widow 1×04 The Escape with Radha Mitchell, Goran Visnjic and Wil Traval.
  • Sunday, March 17th – Welcome to Storybrooke circa 1983 on Once Upon a Time 2×17. Except if you’re an outsider. Then not so welcome. And you might end up the target of a high-speed chase by Sheriff Graham (Jamie Dornan) & Regina (Lana Parrilla).
  • Sunday, March 17th – News of Rainn Wilson (The Office) cast as lead in Hart Hanson’s CBS pilot Backstrom.
  • Friday, March 15th – Once Upon a Time films Jennifer Morrison & Michael Raymond-James on Third Beach in Stanley Park for 2×21
  • Friday, March 15th – Arrow films flashback scenes with Stephen Amell & Katie Cassidy & Oliver’s parents at Harbour Cruises in Coal Harbour for 1×21.
  • Friday, March 15th – The Killing films in Langley.
  • Friday, March 15th – CBS pilot Intelligence starts filming at Deer Lake Park in Burnaby. Josh Holloway not on set.
  • Friday, March 15th – Cult 1×04 with Matt Davis on The CW.
  • Thursday, March 14th – Vancouver played Toronto for Motive 1×06 Detour with scenes filmed at the Victorian Hotel as a Toronto apartment building and Belkin House as a Toronto police station.
  • Thursday, March 14th – Continuum‘s Eric Knudsen & Ian Tracey film at Catch-122 restaurant on West Hastings downtown.
  • Thursday, March 14th – CW pilot The 100 w/ Thomas McDonell as one of 100 juvenile delinquents sent back to Earth after nuclear war starts filming on its Langley set.
  • Thursday, March 14th – Supernatural films in Riverview in Coquitlam.
  • Thursday, March 14th – News that Arrow‘s Stephen Amell, Colin Donnell, Willa Holland, Paul Blackthorne & showrunners, & Falling Skies‘s Drew Roy, Sarah Carter, Seychelle Gabriel & showrunner Remi Aubuchon will be at WonderCon in Anaheim in late March. Schedule.
  • Thursday, March 14th – News that Amanda Tapping of Sanctuary, Stargate SG1 will direct second season’s 12th episode of Continuum.
  • Wednesday. March 13th – Psych‘s Big Foot episode directed by star James Roday airs on the USA Network.
  • Wednesday, March 13th – FOX pilot Human starts filming inside empty bank building on West Pender downtown. Karl Urban on set. Productions signs BELLY pay tribute to Fringe.
  • Wednesday, March 13th – Continuum films in Woodward’s Building downtown.
  • Wednesday, March 13th – Once Upon a Time films scenes at the Steveston Cannery and on Moncton St. with Jennifer Morrison, Michael Raymond-James, Robert Carlyle, Emilie de Ravin and David Anders (on his knees as he tweeted).
  • Wednesday, March 13th – Constellation Award nominations for Continuum, Fringe, Once Upon a Time, Primeval: New World, Supernatural, Jared Padalecki, Jensen Ackles, Read More »WEEK: March 11-17, 2013

WEEK: November 5-11, 2012

  • Sunday, November 11th – Once Upon a Time‘s Red Riding Hood/Ruby-centric episode 2×07 Child of the Moon.
  • Sunday, November 11th – Glen Schaefer (The Province)’s feature on Brent Butt’s big movie No Clue — No Bogart in this Joint
  • Friday, November 9th – Fringe reveals the child Observer whom Walter hid in a pocket universe in the sixth episode of the final season, Through the Looking Glass and What Walter Found.
  • Friday, November 9th – Red Widow films on the North Vancouver waterfront.
  • Friday, November 9th – Bates Motel films in Fort Langley.
  • Friday, November 9th – Battlestar Galactica prequel Blood and Chrome with Ben Cotton debuts first and second webisodes
  • Thursday, November 8th – Sitcom Package Deal tapes its pilot in front of live studio audience in Burnaby.
  • Thursday, November 8th – Brent Butt’s No Clue films in Coal Harbour on a yacht with a follow boat and a technocrane photographed by Rusty Deluce.
  • Thrusday, November 8th – Emily Owens M.D.’s Mamie Gummer & Justin Hartley film at UBC’s Life Sciences Centre,
  • Thursday, November 8th – Fringe films episode eleven on the platform for the West Coast Express at the Waterfront station with Loyalist soldiers, Peter, Olivia, Walter and the child Observer.
  • Thursday, November 8th – News of AMC and Netflix nearing deal for surprise third season of The Killing via Deadline.com.
  • Thursday, November 8th – News of Twilight fans already lining up for Monday’s Los Angeles premiere of The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn 2 Read More »WEEK: November 5-11, 2012

SHOOT: A SINGLE SHOT’s Sam Rockwell method-acting in Langley

If you meet Sam Rockwell coming out of his trailer for the film A Single Shot, he’s a pleasant, genial guy, happy to sign autographs and pose for photos with fans. But as he crosses the street to set he turns into his surly character John Moon, a hunter who’s being tracked by hardened backwater crooks after stumbling into a deep woods campground filled with drugs, cash and the body of a young woman that Moon just killed by accident with a single fatal shot.

Outside Dot’s Diner turned Puffy’s Diner in old town Langley, Sam Rockwell walked head down around and around in a circle before going in the diner door and brushing past a Devon County Sheriff (West Virginia) for the scene. Later Rockwell kicked a garbage can again and again before doing a take of entering the diner. And even later, Rockwell picked up an umbrella and started whacking plastic cartons to get into character. I’d never seen someone method acting like this on location before. It was fascinating to watch.

 

Here he is coming out of the diner after a take. Is that the hint of a smile? It was one of the few times I caughtRead More »SHOOT: A SINGLE SHOT’s Sam Rockwell method-acting in Langley