Northbound Studios : Student Filmmaker Just Beginning

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MEDIA COVERAGE

The Legend
February 2003

Student Filmmaker Just Beginning
by Murray Slough

For multimedia student Deric Olsen, The Haven is just the beginning.

Olsen wrote, produced, directed, shot and editing the 30-minute film, which was shown to a sold-out theatre at the Movie Mill in November. He has entered The Haven into the short film category of the Edmonton Film Festival, but hasn't heard yet if it has been accepted for showing at the spring event.

However, Olsen seems not the least bit concerned, as he is not lacking for projects. He is applying to enter York University's Masters in film program this fall, mulling over several ideas which could be his next major film project, and also now working at the U of L, producing a DVD for the Faculty of Fine Arts.

"I'm looking at the long-term, knowing that with a Master's degree if I'm not working full-time in the industry, I can still teach," says Olsen. He adds that film school of any kind would be a great environment, because he would have other film students and faculty to bounce ideas off, people willing to work on his projects and also be able to collaborate on other students' projects, saying he's not afraid "to pull cables on someone else's film."

Olsen says he was not afforded that luxury with The Haven, as he basically did everything himself, shooting the film in five days, at about 18 hours per day. The entire budget for the film, "including gas" was an amazing $600. Olsen cast eight unpaid actors, all from the Lethbridge area.

Olsen, who grew up in the Waterton area, says he wrote the film - which deals with a secret division of CSIS hunting down a terrorist - with both location and budget in mind.

"We shot in the Waterton area, at the RCMP detachment and the Lodge at Waterton Lakes resort, but when we were using firearms (actually a replica cap gun), we substituted the Westcastle area for Waterton because it was deserted," he says.

Olsen also shot footage on the U of L campus, using the Canadian Centre for Behavorial Neuroscience and some of the library as a substitute for a fictional headquarters in Toronto. Other scenes were shot on 3rd Avenue in Lethbridge and the downtown Esquire's location.