news
Toronto Film Collective Brings Taxidermy to TIFF 2010
Larry (Julian Richings) contemplates his stuffed menagerie as pooch Sammy looks on.
“It was a mix of my girlfriend of five years breaking up with me, my friend’s dog dying, and a Kids in the Hall skit I saw years ago,” says filmmaker Kire Paputts about the inspiration behind his short film Animal Control, which premieres at TIFF this Wednesday. The sixteen-minute film, which stars veteran actor Julian Richings and a Jack Russell terrier, explores what happens when a taxidermist encounters a real live dog. “I’ve always been fascinated by taxidermy,” says Paputts, “but really, it’s a film about relationships.” Well, that, and scalpels.
Paputts and producer/editor James Vandewater began production on Animal Control over seven months ago, as part of a project for Made by Other People, the media collective that they created with six friends in the film industry. The impetus for the collective came from the desire to create a community where films are made collaboratively, with work and input from a range of people. “There’s a culture of filmmaking in Toronto, but I wouldn’t call it a community,” says Vandewater. “But it never just takes one person to make a film; it’s always collaborative. That’s why we called it [this], as in ‘this film was made by other people.'”
Seven of the eight members of Made by Other People met in the Ryerson film program, which Paputts says “did not prepare me for the real world. The collective has a punk, DIY sensibility—we all will do all kinds of different work on each others films.”
The group launched a blog, which documents their projects, in January, and held their first event last month: a screening of seven films directed by members of the collective. While each member had a film to call their own, Vandewater, for example, worked in various roles on five of the seven films. “We have eight different people, so it’s eight different personalities,” says Paputts. “We all give feedback on each other’s work and do different jobs [for each other].”
The communal participation on Animal Control (seven of the members of the collective are listed in the credits) helped overcome some of the hurdles that Paputts faced with the demands of the material—starting with the need for stuffed animals. “Taxidermists, for the most part, are insane,” he says. After meeting with several who they deemed too strange to be on set, Paputts and Vandewater got in contact with millionaire Bill James, who owns a collection of taxidermy animals from his purchase of the Niagara Museum. The borrowing of the animals was negotiated in a strange meeting with James’ assistant in an alley off of the Danforth, resulting in a sweet deal. “We lucked out and got tons of stuff for $500 or so—a very low amount of money,” Paputts says.
The cast and crew set up the film’s surgery scene.
The raccoon that’s dissected in the beginning of the film was even cheaper. “We knew we needed a raccoon for a taxidermist to do on set,” says Vandewater. Two months before filming, while driving to meet with the dog trainer that provided Sammy, the film’s only live animal, Vandewater and Paputts spotted a freshly hit raccoon on the highway. After borrowing some bags and a shovel, they popped the road-kill into the trunk and gunned it back to Toronto, where the body took up residence in Paputts’ mom’s freezer until it was time for its on-camera stuffing.
While the film has a few gory moments, Paputts insists that it isn’t a horror movie. Animal Control will, however, be shown as part of a horror/fantasy festival in Spain, and the bloody bits required quite a bit of communal ingenuity. “It was an elaborate process, with all of us getting together and sharing ideas,” says Paputts. The incision scenes were done with a cow hoof and hide that he found in Chinatown, and the raccoon was eventually thawed and dissected on camera, which gave off an odor that Vandewater describes as “disgusting. People were getting nauseous and had to leave the room.” While Sammy the terrier expresses pain in the movie, the guys emphasize that he’s actually showing excitement to an off-camera treat, and that no animals were hurt in the film. “The dog had a great time,” assures Vandewater. “He was totally happy.”
When Animal Control, which was shown as part of the group’s screening, was in development, Paputts and Vandewater weren’t sure what to expect. “I wanted to take my time with post-production, so I sent the film in [to TIFF] as a work in progress,” says Paputts, who has applied to the festival before and become used to rejection letters. “We have a joke: ‘did you get your annual TIFF rejection yet?'” adds Vandewater. “[Getting in] was really inspiring; it shows us we’re doing something right. Us being at TIFF is good for everybody in the collective.”
With the film’s premier only a day away, Paputts and Vandewater have had to get accustomed to the whirlwind of the festival. “Making a film is one challenge, while promoting it is another. TIFF is a whole other world,” says Paputts, who recently hired a publicist for the first time. “You don’t sell short films,” adds Vandewater. “There’s no way we’ll make our money back, but that’s not the goal.”
The real goal for both filmmakers is to have someone see the movie and decide to finance their future work. “Now I have something that will hopefully open doors,” says Paputts. In the meantime, each member of the collective is working on material to present at their next screening, and updating the blog with their progress and ideas in the process. “So far, we just comment on each other’s work, but it would be great to get outside commentary from readers,” says Vandewater. “We don’t want to be insular. This is about ‘other people’! We want to be open to other communities.”
For this week, though, there’s the excitement of the premier and the schmoozing that it accompanies to prepare for. Luckily, the guys have their collective’s ethos to anchor them within the hubbub. “Our philosophy is to let the work speak for itself. Make your work strong and people will come to you,” says Vandewater. And the confidence of a TIFF showing doesn’t hurt, either. Adds Paputts, “At this point, there’s nothing too big for us to accomplish.”
Production stills by Michael Pierro.