Regent College grad Jason Goode will celebrate the North American premiere of his Okanagan-shot thriller Numb on the closing night of the 2015 Whistler Film Festival this Sunday (December 6).
Numb is billed as a survival thriller: “When a couple in financial distress discover GPS coordinates that promise to lead to stolen gold they partner with a pair of mysterious hitchhikers to enter the remote winter wilderness and recover the coins.”
Goode and producer Dylan Jenkinson tell a tale of perseverance in a production diary they wrote for Reel West. Here are a couple of brief excerpts from the beginning and end of what is quite an eye-opening account of some of the ups an downs experienced in moving from the idea stage to gaining financial support, selecting actors, shooting a ‘teaser trailer’ and a myriad of other elements, both large and small:
Every movie is a miracle, an event that defies the natural order of things, because the vast majority of movies that are developed never get made. Dylan, my producing partner, works full-time in production to pay the bills and support his family, and I work part-time while looking after my kids full time as a stay-at-home dad. Usually a team would try to simultaneously push forward multiple projects, hoping the miracle would happen and one be brought to life. We couldn’t do that. We hoped a miracle would happen with the one project we were incubating. In the end, we discovered that we actually needed a series of miracles to get this film off the ground. . . .
There are so many really talented filmmakers in Vancouver and across the country all trying to get their films made. But so few get the chance. So few new voices get out there to be heard. The film business is tough and the barriers for entry are almost insurmountable. Dylan and I know we’re among the lucky ones. It was a long, arduous journey. Much longer and harder than we imagined when we started. But with the help and support of our family, friends and community, a miracle happened. A miracle in the sense that it would never have happened on its own.
For the full production diary go here.
Climate Change and the Church
Several local Christian and faith-based groups will host an evening about climate change and how the church is responding locally – at Tenth Church Kitsilano on Friday (December 4).
Climate Change and the Church: Faithful Responses to Global Warming will feature a screening of the film This Changes Everything, followed by a short forum, with a panel of speakers from several local Christian and faith-based organizations, including A Rocha, Fossil Free Faith, the Canadian Catholic Organization for Development and Peace, KAIROS, Salal and Cedar, Streams of Justice, and Earthkeepers: Christians for Climate Justice.
A week later (December 11), Earthkeepers will host an Evening of Prayer and Confession at Still Pointe, in the Commercial Drive area. They say:
As discussions draw to a close in Paris, now is the time to gather in prayer to our Creator, crying out for sustained change and healing for all creation as we move forward. There will be a directed prayer service for the first hour, followed by open time for reflection, prayer and confession until the close of the evening. Families and children welcome!
Christian Seasons Calendar
Each year, a small Vancouver church produces a unique product – one which is both useful and beautiful. Its unique Christian Seasons Calendar opens with the season of Advent and turns not with the 12 months but with the rhythm of the Christian seasons: Advent, Christmas, Epiphany, Lent, Holy Week, Easter and the Season after Pentecost.
The calendar, produced by University Hill Congregation on the UBC campus, is praised by a wide range of Christian notables, including Walter Brueggemann, Eugene Peterson, Brian McLaren, Stanley Hauerwas and Marva Dawn. It includes:
- Contemporary art from 10 artists depicting the gospel story
- Scripture readings for Sundays and special days from the common lectionary
- Descriptions of the Christian seasons and suggestions for ways to celebrate them
- Liturgical colours for each season
Go here and here for my earlier comments about the calendar. Or go right to the horse’s mouth and listen to an interesting interview on Ancient Future Faith Network with Ed Searcy, who recently retired as pastor of University Hill Congregation. He and children’s minister Janice Love developed the concept of the calendar. Go here to order the calendar.
Roy Salmond recognized
I missed it at the time, but musician/producer Roy Salmond was – quite properly – recognized for the consistency and quality of his work over the years by GMA Canada. He received a Lifetime Achievement Award at GMA Canada’s Covenant Awards event November 5. Some older readers will remember him as half of Salmond and Mulder, in the 1980s. For much of the time since then, he has produced records for other people from his Whitewater Productions Studio in Surrey.
Go here for a video in which his good friends and collaborators Steve Bell and Carolyn Arends sing his praise.
Bell said:
You have somehow managed to take in all the technological changes over decades, and learn all that new stuff, and yet keep the ways of the elders in it, so to speak, and we are so grateful.
Arends said:
Eugene Peterson [says]: “Conversation is not just hearing, it’s listening things into being.” And Roy, you’re getting your award tonight for a lot of reasons. You can play virtually any instrument, and play it well. You have more production and engineering know-how in your little pinky than most people acquire in a lifetime. You’ve worked on countless award-winning projects. But I think – first and foremost – you’re getting this award tonight for a lifetime spent in conversation with music, a lifetime spent listening things into being.
Following is a portion of his acceptance speech:
We live in a culture that focuses on results. We write songs, sing and record hoping we’ll get noticed. Hoping we’ll be validated and affirmed. Maybe find some success, make some money. Maybe even win some awards. But when we focus on the results that our music brings, it affects the art we make. It changes it. It turns our music and performances into a fishing rod that is looking for a catch. This affects the quality of it and reduces it to a commercial for something other than the art itself.
Make your focus the substance of your craft. Create work that reflects passion, authenticity, virility and empathy. Focus on the rightness, the truth of your work and make that the value you strive for. So when you sing, when you write, when you perform you are reaching for something bigger and deeper than mere approval, which ultimately leads to disappointment and discouragement, and denigrates your work to mere identity.
In so doing, you may not sell a million units, but you will have a better chance at affecting culture in a positive way. And you will bear witness not only to the God that is in you, and in your church, but to the God who is actively participating in the world around you, and calling you to participate with him. And it is worth it if your music can help soften someone’s heart, to turn ever so slightly toward God, and in doing so, make an impact that is beyond the span of one’s lifetime.
And he referred to Arends’ question about one of his quotations – apparently he’s a master of quotations – something involving a Picasso quote about a gorilla and a park bench . . . “and I still don’t really understand that quote.”
Now . . . regarding Carolyn’s mention in her introductory video about the gorilla. It’s a quote from Picasso: “Show me a pretty girl riding a bike beside a beautiful park and I’ll show you a boring picture. Show me a gorilla riding a bike beside a beautiful park and I’ll show you an interesting picture.”
This has to do with settling or not settling for the obvious and the juxtaposing of opposites. When we add a string part or a guitar part that sounds obvious, I decide the song needs a gorilla. Something that goes against the grain and creates an artistic tension to pull the listener in. Something that is not obvious or expected yet somehow works.
Picasso also said “technique (or technology), should never be more than the servant of the heart.” For all you button pushers out there that work with software and sound manipulation like I do . . . remember to never let our recording technology replace the heart. It serves it, as we serve something and someone greater than ourselves in our engineering and our work.
Christmas concerts galore
Do look below for some of the excellent Christmas shows coming up in the next three weeks, from The Singing Christmas Tree to Christmas in the Orpheum with the Vancouver Chamber Choir, A Traditional Christmas with the VSO and Winter Harp.
Sep 2015
Speaking My Mind Toastmasters Club – September 28, 2015 - December 14, 2015 at 7:30 pm - 9:00 pmDec 2015
Lilian Broca: Heroine of a Thousand Pieces - The Judith Mosaics of Lilian Broca – December 3, 2015 at All DayPerogy Night in Vancouver – December 4, 2015 at 5:00 pm - 8:00 pm
Saint James Music Academy Christmas Concert – December 4, 2015 at 6:30 pm - 9:00 pm
Climate Change and the Church: Faithful Responses to Global Warming – December 4, 2015 at 6:45 pm - 9:00 pm
Christmas for Kenya Concert – December 4, 2015 at 7:00 pm - 9:00 pm
Vancouver Chamber Choir: Christmas in the Orpheum - Renaissance, Baroque & Carols – December 4, 2015 at 8:00 pm - 10:00 pm
Chor Leoni: All is Calm: The Christmas Truce of 1914 – December 5, 2015 at All Day
Fair Trade Fair – December 5, 2015 at 10:00 am - 2:00 pm
St. Stephen's Fall Fair – December 5, 2015 at 10:00 am - 3:00 pm
Winter Treasures Marketplace – December 5, 2015 at 10:00 am - 3:00 pm
St. Christopher's Christmas Bazaar – December 5, 2015 at 10:30 am - 1:30 pm
St. Nicholas Fair – December 5, 2015 at 11:00 am - 2:00 pm
Advent Art Exhibit and Jazz Vespers: Repeat, Repeat the Sounding Joy – December 5, 2015 at 12:00 pm - 9:00 pm
The Firs Noel – December 5, 2015 at 6:00 pm - 9:00 pm
With One Voice, a Winter Concert – December 5, 2015 at 7:00 pm - 9:00 pm
Coquitlam Chorale: A Child is Born – December 5, 2015 at 7:30 pm - 9:30 pm
Gloria Dei Chorale: Handel's Messiah – December 5, 2015 at 7:30 pm - 9:30 pm
St. Faith's Christmas and Bake Sale – December 6, 2015 at 11:30 am - 1:30 pm
Christmas with the Bach Choir – December 6, 2015 at 2:00 pm - 4:00 pm
Coquitlam Chorale: A Child is Born – December 6, 2015 at 2:00 pm - 4:00 pm
Winter Harp, with the Vancouver Welsh Men's Choir – December 6, 2015 at 2:00 pm - 4:00 pm
Christmas at the Chan – December 6, 2015 at 2:30 pm - 4:30 pm
Christmas Benefit Concert presented by L’Arche Greater Vancouver – December 6, 2015 at 3:00 pm - 6:00 pm
Ecumenical Advent Service – December 6, 2015 at 3:00 pm - 5:00 pm
Mighty and Beautiful: A Christmas Jazz Vespers – December 6, 2015 at 4:00 pm - 5:30 pm
Music at Queen's: 18th Annual Carols & Bells – December 6, 2015 at 7:00 pm - 9:00 pm
Gloria Dei Chorale: Handel's Messiah – December 6, 2015 at 7:30 pm - 9:30 pm
Public Lecture Series: Competing Paradigms: Christianity and Naturalism – The Future of Christianity and Naturalism – December 8, 2015 at 7:00 pm - 8:30 pm
Let the Bells Ring! North Shore Housing Centre and Shelter Fundraising Concert – December 8, 2015 at 7:30 pm - 9:30 pm
Archie Spencer: The Future of Evangelical Theology – December 9, 2015 at 12:00 pm - 1:00 pm
#Welcome Refugees: Town Hall Forum – December 9, 2015 at 7:00 pm - 9:00 pm
Jubilee Christmas Tour: Booth Brothers, Greater Vision, Legacy Five – December 9, 2015 at 7:00 pm - 9:00 pm
Jazz Evensong: Jaclyn Guillou – December 9, 2015 at 8:00 pm - 10:00 pm
Bev Ellis: Splendour of the Raw & Flawed – December 10, 2015 - December 18, 2015 at All Day
Let There Be Light! – December 10, 2015 at 12:00 am
Timberline Country Christmas 2015 – December 10, 2015 - December 20, 2015 at All Day
A Christmas Carol – December 10, 2015 - December 12, 2015 at 7:00 pm - 9:00 pm
The Many Storeys and Last Days of Thomas Merton – December 10, 2015 at 7:00 pm - 9:00 pm
A Traditional Christmas with the VSO – December 10, 2015 at 7:30 pm - 9:30 pm
A Christmas Carol: On the Air – December 10, 2015 at 8:00 pm - 10:00 pm
48th Annual Singing Christmas Tree: Toy Factory – December 11, 2015 - December 13, 2015 at All Day
Miracle: Songs in the Night – December 11, 2015 - December 13, 2015 at All Day
Jesus and Other Refugees: Both Sides of Christmas – December 11, 2015 at 7:00 am - 8:30 am
A Traditional Christmas with the VSO – December 11, 2015 at 4:00 pm - 6:00 pm
Earthkeepers: Evening of Prayer and Confession – December 11, 2015 at 5:00 pm - 8:00 pm
A Traditional Christmas with the VSO – December 11, 2015 at 7:30 pm - 9:30 pm
Vancouver Orpheus Choir: Songs for a Winter's Night – December 11, 2015 at 7:30 pm - 9:30 pm
Celebrate!: A Good Noise Christmas – December 11, 2015 at 8:00 pm - 10:00 pm
Fred Peter: Art Fundraiser for Refugees – December 12, 2015 - December 13, 2015 at All Day
A Traditional Christmas with the VSO – December 12, 2015 at 4:00 am - 6:00 am
First Noel – December 12, 2015 at 9:30 am - 12:00 pm
Roy Durman Annual Christmas Banquet – December 12, 2015 at 4:30 pm - 6:30 pm
North Shore Community Christmas Dinner 2015 – December 12, 2015 at 5:30 pm - 8:30 pm
A Christmas Potpourri: Malcolm Guite [UK poet] & Friends – December 12, 2015 at 7:00 pm - 9:00 pm
A Traditional Christmas with the VSO – December 12, 2015 at 7:30 pm - 9:30 pm
Celebrate!: A Good Noise Christmas – December 12, 2015 at 8:00 pm - 10:00 pm
Vancouver Bach Choir: Handel's Messiah – December 12, 2015 at 8:00 pm - 10:00 pm
Reframe 10-session course connecting Faith & Life (first & third Sundays) – December 13, 2015 at 1:00 pm - 2:30 pm
Celebrate!: A Good Noise Christmas – December 13, 2015 at 3:00 pm - 5:00 pm
Carol Sing-a-Long with the Vancouver Children’s Choir – December 13, 2015 at 4:00 pm - 5:30 pm
Marcus Mosely Chorale and Band: Love Comes Alive - a Jazz Vespers Event – December 13, 2015 at 4:00 pm - 5:30 pm
Blue Christmas – December 13, 2015 at 7:00 pm - 9:00 pm
Gloria Dei Chorale: Christmas 'Lessons and Carols' – December 13, 2015 at 7:00 pm - 9:00 pm
Holly Johnson: Art Show and Sale – December 13, 2015 at 7:00 pm - 9:00 pm
A Traditional Christmas with the VSO – December 13, 2015 at 7:30 pm - 9:30 pm
Music at Queen's: Caelestra – December 13, 2015 at 7:30 pm - 9:30 pm
Christmas Presence (not every night) – December 13, 2015 - December 21, 2015 at 8:00 pm - 10:30 pm
Gloria Dei Chorale: Christmas 'Lessons and Carols' – December 14, 2015 at 7:00 pm - 9:00 pm
Expecting Emmanuel – December 14, 2015 at 7:30 pm - 9:30 pm
Blind Boys of Alabama Holiday Show – December 14, 2015 at 8:00 pm - 10:00 pm
Reason for the Season – December 15, 2015 at 6:30 pm - 8:30 pm
Brass & Organ Concert – December 15, 2015 at 7:30 pm - 9:00 pm
musica intima: A Christmas Story – December 15, 2015 at 7:30 pm - 9:30 pm
Vancouver Pastors Prayer Fellowship Annual Christmas Gathering – December 16, 2015 at 10:30 am - 2:00 pm
Bethlehem Walk – December 16, 2015 - December 17, 2015 at 6:30 pm - 8:30 pm
A Traditional Christmas with the VSO – December 16, 2015 at 7:30 pm - 9:30 pm
Winter Harp – December 16, 2015 at 7:30 pm - 9:30 pm
Jazz Evensong: We 3 Queens – Karin Plato & Kate Hammett-Vaughan & Jennifer Scott – December 16, 2015 at 8:00 pm - 10:00 pm
A Traditional Christmas with the VSO – December 17, 2015 at 4:30 pm - 6:30 pm
Winter Harp – December 17, 2015 at 7:30 pm - 9:30 pm
A Traditional Christmas with the VSO – December 17, 2015 at 8:00 pm - 10:00 pm
A Traditional Christmas with the VSO – December 18, 2015 at 4:00 pm - 6:00 pm
Christmas with Chor Leoni – December 18, 2015 at 4:30 pm - 6:30 pm
A Traditional Christmas with the VSO – December 18, 2015 at 7:30 pm - 9:30 pm
musica intima: A Christmas Story – December 18, 2015 at 7:30 pm - 9:30 pm
Christmas with Chor Leoni – December 18, 2015 at 8:00 pm - 10:00 pm
Vancouver Chamber Choir: A Dylan Thomas Christmas - A Child's Christmas in Wales – December 18, 2015 at 8:00 pm - 10:00 pm
Christmas with Chor Leoni – December 19, 2015 at 2:00 pm - 4:00 pm
Vancouver Cantata Singers: Christmas Reprise XIII – December 19, 2015 at 2:00 pm - 4:00 pm
A Traditional Christmas with the VSO – December 19, 2015 at 4:00 pm - 6:00 pm
Laudate Singers Free Family Christmas Concert – December 19, 2015 at 4:00 pm - 5:00 pm
Christmas Eleganza Tour with Claudia Santiago and Special Guest Performers – December 19, 2015 at 7:00 pm - 9:30 pm
Gloria Project Concert – December 19, 2015 at 7:00 pm - 9:00 pm
The Story of Christmas – December 19, 2015 at 7:00 pm - 9:00 pm
A Traditional Christmas with the VSO – December 19, 2015 at 7:30 pm - 9:30 pm
musica intima: A Christmas Story – December 19, 2015 at 7:30 pm - 9:30 pm
Winter Harp – December 19, 2015 at 7:30 pm - 9:30 pm
Vancouver Chamber Choir: A Charlie Brown Christms - Finding the True Meaning – December 19, 2015 at 8:00 pm - 10:00 pm
Winter Harp – December 20, 2015 at All Day