WILDsound Film Festival
Encyclopedia
The WILDsound Film Festival is a publicly-attended film festival
held every month except September in Toronto
, Ontario
, Canada
. The festival is held at the National Film Board of Canada, world-renowned for animation
including the Oscar-winning The Danish Poet
(2006) and Oscar-nominated Madame Tulti-Putli (2007). WILDsound screens shorts selected from international submissions and hosts readings of new scripts.
Each WILDsound monthly festival is a two-day event.
Fridays feature the best new screenplay
s submitted from writers around the world. Depending on what is received, television pilot
s, feature film scripts, short screenplays, or spec script
s may be programmed.
On Saturdays, WILDsound screens a selection of international short films. There is no restriction on genre, although few films of more than 30 minutes are screened.
Past moderators have included Toronto International Film Festival
co-founder Bill Marshall, film critics Norman Wilner, Bruce Kirkland, Liz Braun, Liam Lacey, and Susan Walker, radio host John Moore
, writer/actor Paul Bellini
(The Kids in the Hall
), writers Elan Mastai, Karl Schiffman, and James Hurst (Degrassi), actors Pamela Sinha and Peter Keleghan
, casting directors/agents Ron Leach, Glenn Cockburn, master story editor Marguerite Pigott, and other industry professionals like Tasso Lakas (ACTRA
), John May, Michael Kennedy
, Erin Faith Young, John Galway (The Greenburg Fund), Colin Brunton
, and David Weaver.
and Tim Guinee
(2006), Marc Lougee's The Pit and the Pendulum
, Jeffrey Pike's Love and Defiance, Darling Darling starring Michael Cera
, award-winning animated film Red Princess Blues Tribeca Film Festival
best documentary short Native New Yorker
and controversial Sundance Film Festival
hit First Date by Gary Huggins.
The scripts are read by professional Canadian actors, including Chris Violette
, Von Flores
, Joe Dinicol
, Chris Owens
, and many other respected performers.
Screenplays have included "The Swimmer Manuscript" by Joseph Kenny, one of the most highly praised feature scripts of all time, "Heart of America" by veteran television writer Rogers Turrentine (The Rockford Files
, Magnum, P.I.
) who has also worked extensively with The Sopranos
creator David Chase
, "Kinky and Remus Get Blunt!" by Rae Dawn Chong
and "Streetcar" by Frederick Weller. WILDsound has also given writers an opportunity to showcase their television spec scripts from such current and past television shows as Corner Gas
, Entourage
, and 30 Rock
.
WILDsound also features regular entertainment industry columnists including actress Precious Chong (daughter of Tommy Chong
, writer Daren Foster, and Huffington Post official blogger Mitchell Bard.
In June 2006, Lift Out Loud was re-invented as WILDsound by Toffolo and Wildcard Pictures Corp partner Jen Frankel. The reading series moved out of LIFT to the Pilot Tavern, a historic pub in Toronto's Yorkville
district. The Film Festival began in January 2007 at the National Film Board of Canada, and the Reading Series event moved to the NFB as well in June 2007.
From January 2008 until June 2008, the Festival featured a Sunday matinee event as well, at which new features or longer-form shorts were screened, including the acclaimed documentaries "Alcatraz Reunion" and "Working Class Rockstar."
The WILDsound selection committee has included writers Jen Frankel and Robert Reece, director Drew Potter, editor Mark Sanders, casting director Ron Leach, writer/comedian Andrea Mitchell, and actor Wes Berger.
Jen Frankel is a writer, producer, and performer and partners with Toffolo in Wildcard Pictures Corp., a film production company based in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. She has performed across Canada in Fringe Festivals and is the author of a novel "The Last Rite". With Toffolo, she wrote or produced ten short films since 2005.
Films produced by Wildcard Pictures Corp. have screened internationally at festivals like the Bare Bones International Film Festival
, The Miami Gay & Lesbian Film Festival and the Connecticut Film Festival
Film festival
A film festival is an organised, extended presentation of films in one or more movie theaters or screening venues, usually in a single locality. More and more often film festivals show part of their films to the public by adding outdoor movie screenings...
held every month except September in Toronto
Toronto
Toronto is the provincial capital of Ontario and the largest city in Canada. It is located in Southern Ontario on the northwestern shore of Lake Ontario. A relatively modern city, Toronto's history dates back to the late-18th century, when its land was first purchased by the British monarchy from...
, Ontario
Ontario
Ontario is a province of Canada, located in east-central Canada. It is Canada's most populous province and second largest in total area. It is home to the nation's most populous city, Toronto, and the nation's capital, Ottawa....
, Canada
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
. The festival is held at the National Film Board of Canada, world-renowned for animation
Animation
Animation is the rapid display of a sequence of images of 2-D or 3-D artwork or model positions in order to create an illusion of movement. The effect is an optical illusion of motion due to the phenomenon of persistence of vision, and can be created and demonstrated in several ways...
including the Oscar-winning The Danish Poet
The Danish Poet
The Danish Poet is a 2006 animated short film written, directed, and animated by Torill Kove and narrated by Liv Ullmann. A co-production of the National Film Board of Canada and Mikrofilm AS of Norway, it has won both the Academy Award and Genie Award for best animated short film.-Synopsis:The...
(2006) and Oscar-nominated Madame Tulti-Putli (2007). WILDsound screens shorts selected from international submissions and hosts readings of new scripts.
Each WILDsound monthly festival is a two-day event.
Fridays feature the best new screenplay
Screenplay
A screenplay or script is a written work that is made especially for a film or television program. Screenplays can be original works or adaptations from existing pieces of writing. In them, the movement, actions, expression, and dialogues of the characters are also narrated...
s submitted from writers around the world. Depending on what is received, television pilot
Television pilot
A "television pilot" is a standalone episode of a television series that is used to sell the show to a television network. At the time of its inception, the pilot is meant to be the "testing ground" to see if a series will be possibly desired and successful and therefore a test episode of an...
s, feature film scripts, short screenplays, or spec script
Spec script
A spec script, also known as a speculative screenplay, is a non-commissioned unsolicited screenplay. It is usually written by a screenwriter who hopes to have the script optioned and eventually purchased by a producer, production company, or studio....
s may be programmed.
On Saturdays, WILDsound screens a selection of international short films. There is no restriction on genre, although few films of more than 30 minutes are screened.
General
WILDsound bills itself as a "feedback film festival" and claims to be the most unique film festival in the world because it constantly turns a critical eye on the writers and filmmakers that participate. Each event is moderated by an industry professional who leads the audience in a feedback session after the screenings or reading. The artists are encouraged to be present, but do not identify themselves or participate in the feedback.Past moderators have included Toronto International Film Festival
Toronto International Film Festival
The Toronto International Film Festival is a publicly-attended film festival held each September in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. In 2010, 339 films from 59 countries were screened at 32 screens in downtown Toronto venues...
co-founder Bill Marshall, film critics Norman Wilner, Bruce Kirkland, Liz Braun, Liam Lacey, and Susan Walker, radio host John Moore
John Moore
- Clergy :*John Moore , British Scholar*John Moore , English Baptist minister from Northampton*John Moore , Archbishop of Canterbury, Privy Counsellor...
, writer/actor Paul Bellini
Paul Bellini
Paul Bellini is a Canadian comedy writer and television actor. Bellini is well-known figure in the Canadian television comedy industry due to his work on The Kids in the Hall and This Hour Has 22 Minutes. He has worked on several projects with Josh Levy and PJ DeBoy...
(The Kids in the Hall
The Kids in the Hall
The Kids in the Hall is a Canadian sketch comedy group formed in 1984, consisting of comedians Dave Foley, Kevin McDonald, Bruce McCulloch, Mark McKinney, and Scott Thompson. Their eponymous television show ran from 1988 to 1994 on CBC in Canada, and 1989 to 1995 on CBS and HBO in the United States...
), writers Elan Mastai, Karl Schiffman, and James Hurst (Degrassi), actors Pamela Sinha and Peter Keleghan
Peter Keleghan
Peter Keleghan is a Canadian television actor, who has played roles in several popular Canadian comedy series.Keleghan's best-known roles have been film industry CEO Alan Roy on Made in Canada, low-IQ news anchor Jim Walcott on The Newsroom, and Ranger Gord on The Red Green Show...
, casting directors/agents Ron Leach, Glenn Cockburn, master story editor Marguerite Pigott, and other industry professionals like Tasso Lakas (ACTRA
ACTRA
The Alliance of Canadian Cinema, Television and Radio Artists is a Canadian labour union representing performers in English-language media. It has 22,000 members working in film, television, radio, and all other recorded media....
), John May, Michael Kennedy
Michael Kennedy (director)
Michael Kennedy is a Canadian film and television director, writer and composer born in Summerside, Prince Edward Island, Canada.-Career:...
, Erin Faith Young, John Galway (The Greenburg Fund), Colin Brunton
Colin Brunton
Colin Brunton is a Canadian producer and director. After creating the short films The Last Pogo , A Trip Around Lake Ontario and The Mysterious Moon Men of Canada , Genie Award winner for Best Live Action Short), Brunton produced the feature films Roadkill and Highway 61 with director Bruce...
, and David Weaver.
Short Film Festival
Since January 2007, WILDsound has screened well over 100 shorts from around the world including The Shovel featuring David StrathairnDavid Strathairn
David Russell Strathairn is an American actor. He was nominated for an Academy Award for portraying journalist Edward R. Murrow in Good Night, and Good Luck...
and Tim Guinee
Tim Guinee
Timothy S. "Tim" Guinee is an American stage, television, and feature film actor.-Life and career:Guinee, who has two brothers and two sisters, was born in Los Angeles, California and raised in Illinois and Texas....
(2006), Marc Lougee's The Pit and the Pendulum
The Pit and the Pendulum
"The Pit and the Pendulum" is a short story written by Edgar Allan Poe and first published in 1842 in the literary annual The Gift: A Christmas and New Year's Present for 1843. The story is about the torments endured by a prisoner of the Spanish Inquisition, though Poe skews historical facts. The...
, Jeffrey Pike's Love and Defiance, Darling Darling starring Michael Cera
Michael Cera
Michael Austin Cera is a Canadian actor best known for his roles in Arrested Development, Youth in Revolt, Superbad, Scott Pilgrim vs. the World, Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist and Juno. Cera received the 2008 Canadian Comedy Award for best male performance for his work in Superbad.-Early...
, award-winning animated film Red Princess Blues Tribeca Film Festival
Tribeca Film Festival
The Tribeca Film Festival is a film festival founded in 2002 by Jane Rosenthal, Robert De Niro and Craig Hatkoff in a response to the September 11, 2001 attacks on the World Trade Center and the consequent loss of vitality in the TriBeCa neighborhood in Lower Manhattan.The mission of the festival...
best documentary short Native New Yorker
Native New Yorker (film)
Native New Yorker is the title of the 2006 Tribeca Film Festival Best Documentary Short by Steve Bilich.Filmed with a 1924 hand-crank Cine-Kodak camera, Shaman Trail Scout 'Coyote' takes a journey which transcends time, from Inwood Park , down a native trail , into lower Manhattan Native New...
and controversial Sundance Film Festival
Sundance Film Festival
The Sundance Film Festival is a film festival that takes place annually in Utah, in the United States. It is the largest independent cinema festival in the United States. Held in January in Park City, Salt Lake City, and Ogden, as well as at the Sundance Resort, the festival is a showcase for new...
hit First Date by Gary Huggins.
Screenplay Festival
At the Features Head to Head to Head events, the first act of each of three features is read and the audience selects their favorite to be read in its entirety the following month. The winning feature film is also accompanied by the finalists of the One-Page Screenplay Competition, and the winner of that is made into a short film. Past winners of the One-Page Competition include Bea C. Rodriguez's Pronouncing, a first screenplay by a Filipino writer from Chicago. Winners of the Features event include screenplays from England, Canada, and the United States, while showcased writers have come from all around the world.The scripts are read by professional Canadian actors, including Chris Violette
Chris Violette
Chris Violette is a Canadian actor. He graduated with a business diploma and flew to Europe to explore. By the time he came home, he had decided to take a few years to focus on becoming an entertainer. He started with modeling, but then started attending acting classes...
, Von Flores
Von Flores
Von Flores is the stage name of Valentin Andres Tanga Flores IV, a Filipino-Canadian actor. Flores has enjoyed leading roles in a number of television productions, including the series Kung Fu: The Legend Continues and the Atlantis Films TekWar, TekJustice and TekLords TV movies...
, Joe Dinicol
Joe Dinicol
Joe Dinicol is a Canadian actor.Dinicol was born in Stratford, Ontario, the son of acting coach and actor Keith Dinicol. He started his career as a child actor at the Stratford Shakespeare Festival, and has since appeared on national Canadian television series Train 48 and Rideau Hall...
, Chris Owens
Chris Owens (actor)
Christopher Bradley "Chris" Owens is a Canadian actor.Owens was born in Toronto, the son of Jeannette, a jazz singer, and Garry Owens, a jazz drummer....
, and many other respected performers.
Screenplays have included "The Swimmer Manuscript" by Joseph Kenny, one of the most highly praised feature scripts of all time, "Heart of America" by veteran television writer Rogers Turrentine (The Rockford Files
The Rockford Files
The Rockford Files is an American television drama series which aired on the NBC network between September 13, 1974 and January 10, 1980. It has remained in regular syndication to the present day. The show stars James Garner as Los Angeles-based private investigator Jim Rockford and features Noah...
, Magnum, P.I.
Magnum, P.I.
Magnum, P.I. is an American television series starring Tom Selleck as Thomas Magnum, a private investigator living on Oahu, Hawaii. The series ran from 1980 to 1988 in first-run broadcast on the American CBS television network....
) who has also worked extensively with The Sopranos
The Sopranos
The Sopranos is an American television drama series created by David Chase that revolves around the New Jersey-based Italian-American mobster Tony Soprano and the difficulties he faces as he tries to balance the often conflicting requirements of his home life and the criminal organization he heads...
creator David Chase
David Chase
David Chase is an American writer, director, and producer of television series. Chase has worked in television for more than 30 years; he has produced and written for shows as The Rockford Files, I'll Fly Away, and Northern Exposure. He has created two original series; the first, Almost Grown,...
, "Kinky and Remus Get Blunt!" by Rae Dawn Chong
Rae Dawn Chong
Rae Dawn Chong is a Canadian-American actress.-Life and career:Chong was born in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada, the daughter of Maxine Sneed and Tommy Chong. She and her sister Robbi were raised by her grandmother, Tommy Chong's mother. Chong's father is of Chinese and Scottish-Irish ancestry and her...
and "Streetcar" by Frederick Weller. WILDsound has also given writers an opportunity to showcase their television spec scripts from such current and past television shows as Corner Gas
Corner Gas
Corner Gas is a Canadian television sitcom created by Brent Butt. The series ran for six seasons from 2004 to 2009. Re-runs still air on CTV and The Comedy Network in Canada; it formerly aired on WGN America in the United States....
, Entourage
Entourage (TV series)
Entourage is an American comedy-drama television series that premiered on HBO on July 18, 2004 and concluded on September 11, 2011, after eight seasons...
, and 30 Rock
30 Rock
30 Rock is an American television comedy series created by Tina Fey that airs on NBC. The series is loosely based on Fey's experiences as head writer for Saturday Night Live...
.
Website
WILDsound has one of the largest, most extensive, and fastest-growing film sites in the world, featuring hundreds of online shorts and feedback videos from past events.WILDsound also features regular entertainment industry columnists including actress Precious Chong (daughter of Tommy Chong
Tommy Chong
Tommy Chong is a Canadian-American comedian, actor, writer, director, activist, and musician who is well known for his stereotypical portrayals of hippie-era stoners...
, writer Daren Foster, and Huffington Post official blogger Mitchell Bard.
History
The WILDsound Film Festival was created by Matthew Toffolo and began life as "Lift Out Loud", a monthly screenplay reading series at the Liaison of Independent Filmmakers of Toronto (LIFT).In June 2006, Lift Out Loud was re-invented as WILDsound by Toffolo and Wildcard Pictures Corp partner Jen Frankel. The reading series moved out of LIFT to the Pilot Tavern, a historic pub in Toronto's Yorkville
Yorkville, Toronto
Yorkville is a district in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, well known for its shopping. It is a former village, annexed by the City of Toronto. It is roughly bounded by Bloor Street to the south, Davenport Road to the north, Yonge Street to the east and Avenue Road to the west, and is considered part of...
district. The Film Festival began in January 2007 at the National Film Board of Canada, and the Reading Series event moved to the NFB as well in June 2007.
From January 2008 until June 2008, the Festival featured a Sunday matinee event as well, at which new features or longer-form shorts were screened, including the acclaimed documentaries "Alcatraz Reunion" and "Working Class Rockstar."
The WILDsound selection committee has included writers Jen Frankel and Robert Reece, director Drew Potter, editor Mark Sanders, casting director Ron Leach, writer/comedian Andrea Mitchell, and actor Wes Berger.
Founders
Matthew Toffolo moved from a successful career in grocery store to film after attaining both broadcasting and film degrees. He has produced and/or directed more than a dozen shorts and music videos including the big-budget "Headhunter" and "The Yard Sale".Jen Frankel is a writer, producer, and performer and partners with Toffolo in Wildcard Pictures Corp., a film production company based in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. She has performed across Canada in Fringe Festivals and is the author of a novel "The Last Rite". With Toffolo, she wrote or produced ten short films since 2005.
Films produced by Wildcard Pictures Corp. have screened internationally at festivals like the Bare Bones International Film Festival
Bare Bones International Film Festival
The Bare Bones International Film Festival was founded in 1999 by the Darkwood Film Arts Institute in the city of Muskogee, Oklahoma to showcase low-budget independent movies...
, The Miami Gay & Lesbian Film Festival and the Connecticut Film Festival