Pre-Production

Every movie production is like a puzzle, with elements that fall together in their own unique way. Over the past few months, we have been piecing together the puzzle for Donovan's Echo, slowly pulling the story off the page and bringing it into action. That said, while crickets have been chirping on the blog front (as usual), plenty of hard work has been going on behind the scenes as we tweak, cast, scout, and more.

Since opening our production office at Vancouver Film Studios a couple weeks ago, our team has quickly grown in size, with new faces coming on board every day. We are really excited about this group of great people we are collaborating with, as everyone is using their own special talents to help us bring this ambitious project to life.

Speaking of new faces joining us, we feel very fortunate to have attached two very respected actors to star in the roles of Donovan and Finnley. We are thrilled to finally announce Danny Glover as Donovan Matheson and Bruce Greenwood as Finnley Boyd.

Now that the ball is gaining momentum, and we are almost a week away from production, we plan to update this blog more often with all kinds of behind the scenes news as it develops!

Stay tuned!

PACKAGING

Over the last year we have been working with producers Trent Carlson, Andria Spring, and Mary Anne Waterhouse (all of The Thaw and Fido). They have challenged us to bring the Donovan's Echo script to a whole new level. We’re very thrilled by their involvement and enthusiasm.

The last couple of months have since been spent in a Packaging phase. During this time, we have created great new support materials, storyboards and animatics for promotional purposes.

We apologize for the large gaps of time between blog postings, but filmmaking is a time-consuming process... and things are finally about to get very interesting.

Stay tuned...

DEVELOPMENT

It's been a looong time since the last post, with many challenges and successes in that while, but certainly nothing too worthy to note...

Until now.

We're very pleased to say that we've obtained an established executive producer who we're quite eager to work with. As a result, we're now officially in 'development' and aiming towards production next year.

More to come...

WRITING IS RE-WRITING

It's been awhile since our last update.

Upon receiving some very thorough constructive-yet-positive 'coverage' (screenplay lingo for 'feedback/notes') from a few development execs, and a hiatus in September, we're currently in the midst of writing a new draft of 'Donovan's Echo' with very specific goals in mind.

Why another draft? For as the classic screenwriting adage goes: 'Writing is Rewriting'.

In film production, first draft screenplays are seldom rushed to development, let alone the second, or third. Earlier drafts of M. Night Shyamalan's classic 'The Sixth Sense' didn't include the famous twist which it's now most known for, while Damon and Affleck's brilliant 'Good Will Hunting' originally had much more focus on the FBI's attempts to recruit young Will than in the final screen version.

Overall, it's been an incredibly positive experience and we are very excited about how the latest draft is taking shape. Meanwhile, our other developments mentioned in an earlier post are continuing to unfold.

Stay tuned...

CBC INTERVIEW

Following his presentation at Kelowna's Mosaic Books (Cliffehanger: The Animated Imagination of Jim Cliffe), David French with the CBC Radio requested an interview as Jim discussed illustration, animation and film explorations.

You can LISTEN to the edited version HERE.