Red carpet opening for war film shot near Calgary
Calgary is rolling out the red carpet for Passchendaele, a First World War drama with significant Alberta pedigree.
The province invested more than $5 million in the $21-million production, and much of it was shot last year in and around Calgary ó the birthplace of the movie’s writer, director, co-producer and star, Paul Gross.
Gross is best known for his role as the upright Mountie in the television program Due South.
An invitation-only screening at the Jack Singer Concert Hall kicked off Wednesday evening with a marching military band and a “red carpet photo opportunity.”
In an interview with CBC News Wednesday afternoon, Gross recalled the initial funding meeting with then-premier Ralph Klein, who was expected to be in the audience for the Calgary premiere.
“It was one of the oddest meetings I’ve had in my life .Ö I think he was kind of eager to get the meeting over with, because he was already wearing golf cleats,” Gross said. “[Without] the confidence this province had in the project, we really would not have made it.”
Passchendaele kicked off Toronto’s film festival in September to great fanfare, but the absence at Calgary’s film festival a week later had some of the city’s film workers miffed.
“The Toronto Film Festival is international,” explained Gross on Wednesday. “Of course it makes a lot of people aware of it and we thought it was a good way to kick-off the overall promotional part of it.”
Inspired by his grandfather
Gross has spent the last decade trying to get the project made. He was inspired by his grandfather, one of thousands of Albertans who fought in the small Belgian village of Passchendaele in 1917. The main character of the film bears his grandfather’s name, Sgt. Michael Dunne.
“He was there all the way through it. A very guiding spirit,” recalled Gross.
The battle, also known as the Third Battle of Ypres, resulted in half a million Allied casualties for a gain of only a few miles.
Beginning on Oct. 26, 1917, Canadian troops drove back the German army to take Passchendaele in a 12-day offensive across marshland pitted with craters and made almost impassable by heavy rains.
Some 16,000 Canadians were killed or wounded, and the strategic gains were small ó eight kilometres of territory, which would be taken back by the Germans later in the war. But the victory helped establish the Canadian soldierís international reputation for awe-inspiring tenacity.
Categories