With likeminded organization, Soldiers Never More, as their partner, REMIX helps create  a recording studio in the neighborhood known as “The Enchanted Land” (Tera Encantada).

When an unexpected relationship is forged between our REMIXers and the young people
in the neighborhoods they visit, the true weight and brutality facing the youth in Rio sets
in and the need to help is redefined.

Want more?  Watch the 12 minute Featurette.

The full one hour documentary will be showing here soon.  Check back or follow us on Twitter and join the facebook group.

With likeminded organization, Soldiers Never More, as their partner, REMIX helps create  a recording studio in the neighborhood known as “The Enchanted Land” (Tera Encantada).

When an unexpected relationship is forged between our REMIXers and the young people
in the neighborhoods they visit, the true weight and brutality facing the youth in Rio sets
in and the need to help is redefined.

Want more?  Watch the 12 minute Featurette.

The full one hour documentary will be showing here soon.  Check back or follow us on Twitter and join the facebook group.

With likeminded organization, Soldiers Never More, as their partner, REMIX helps create  a recording studio in the neighborhood known as “The Enchanted Land” (Tera Encantada).

When an unexpected relationship is forged between our REMIXers and the young people
in the neighborhoods they visit, the true weight and brutality facing the youth in Rio sets
in and the need to help is redefined.

Want more?  Watch the 12 minute Featurette.

The full one hour documentary will be showing here soon.  Check back or follow us on Twitter and join the facebook group.

With likeminded organization, Soldiers Never More, as their partner, REMIX helps create  a recording studio in the neighborhood known as “The Enchanted Land” (Tera Encantada).

When an unexpected relationship is forged between our REMIXers and the young people
in the neighborhoods they visit, the true weight and brutality facing the youth in Rio sets
in and the need to help is redefined.

Want more?  Watch the 12 minute Featurette.

The full one hour documentary will be showing here soon.  Check back or follow us on Twitter and join the facebook group.

With likeminded organization, Soldiers Never More, as their partner, REMIX helps create  a recording studio in the neighborhood known as “The Enchanted Land” (Tera Encantada).

When an unexpected relationship is forged between our REMIXers and the young people
in the neighborhoods they visit, the true weight and brutality facing the youth in Rio sets
in and the need to help is redefined.

Want more?  Watch the 12 minute Featurette.

The full one hour documentary will be showing here soon.  Check back or follow us on Twitter and join the facebook group.

With likeminded organization, Soldiers Never More, as their partner, REMIX helps create  a recording studio in the neighborhood known as “The Enchanted Land” (Tera Encantada).

When an unexpected relationship is forged between our REMIXers and the young people
in the neighborhoods they visit, the true weight and brutality facing the youth in Rio sets
in and the need to help is redefined.

Want more?  Watch the 12 minute Featurette.

The full one hour documentary will be showing here soon.  Check back or follow us on Twitter and join the facebook group.

With likeminded organization, Soldiers Never More, as their partner, REMIX helps create  a recording studio in the neighborhood known as “The Enchanted Land” (Tera Encantada).

When an unexpected relationship is forged between our REMIXers and the young people
in the neighborhoods they visit, the true weight and brutality facing the youth in Rio sets
in and the need to help is redefined.

Want more?  Watch the 12 minute Featurette.

The full one hour documentary will be showing here soon.  Check back or follow us on Twitter and join the facebook group.

I don’t mean to hate on Brantford, I had never even been there before. And beside it being the birth place of Gretzky, I knew nothing about it. As a result, I expected very little from them. They are a little festival in their first year in a small town an hour outside Toronto. To be quite honest as I sat in the park out front before my screening I was certain that the whole place was going to be empty.

Well, I was wrong. The Brantford peeps knocked it out of the park. Everything from tickets and programs to the atmosphere and the turn out was great. Maybe I am blushing a bit because my screening went over well but I gotta say it was a great experience.

If you are looking to screen at a small but very supportive fest then keep this one on your radar.

If you are close to the area you really need going to this fest as on of your to-dos for next year.

The fest also was pretty surprising with the quality of films the brought in, I’m Still Here, Sounds Like A Revolution, Antarctica Challenge: A Global Warning and a stack of great shorts.

The venue choices may have been the odd point of the festival but even that made me love the fest even more. I mean where else can you watch a film where a character snorts coke of a hooker’s breasts and talks about wanting to sniff their bum holes-IN A CHURCH.

Brantford fest, I like your style.

“The death rate per inhabitant of Rio’s favelas is far higher than any other city in the world and one study found comparisons with battle-related statistics more applicable. For example, while 322 Palestinian and Israeli children died in the Intifada between September 2000 and August 2002, a total of 612 children were shot dead in Rio during the same period.”

- Conor Foley
The Guardian UK

Rio is fucked. I love the place but it is fucked up. It’s stuffed to the tits with corrupt politicians, it has a completely disgusting divide between the rich and the poor and even by wildly liberal standards the favelas are nothing short of war zones. (Despite the fact that they are NOT seen as such by some large organizations -War Child I am looking at YOU}.

“A study published in Brazil concludes that more young people below the age of 18 are killed by guns each year in Rio de Janeiro than in many areas of the world formally at war. The study concludes that there are strong similarities between children involved in drug wars in Rio’s slums and child soldiers elsewhere in the world.”

-Tom Gibb
BBC correspondent in Brazil

For all intents and purposes the young and poverty stricken people of Rio De Janeiro’s favelas are in the midst of war. The Favelas are amazing places. They are a sight to behold. You cannot go there but TRUST me they are magical. They are filled with amazing people, sights and sounds but what they have to deal with on a daily basis is disturbing at best.

Both sides are guilty, the cops are criminal murderous assholes and the drug gangs are filled with controlling psychopaths. It sucks in every direction. And yet amidst this there are awesome kids just living life and trying to be happy. While shooting this film I remember going into neighborhoods and playing with beautiful kids. Awesome little kids who kick around a shitty two dollar ball against a bullet riddled wall next to garbage…AND THEY ARE HAPPY. And I remember returning two days later to finish interviews only to find out all those kids had been gunned down a police raid just hours before.

I’m not sure what the point of this post is but I just scrolled through my film and I was thinking, statistically, a large portion of the kids I am looking at will be dead by the age of 20. That just doesn’t sit right with me.

Cutting a trailer is tricky. And by “tricky” I mean really fucking agonizing and painful. It is especially difficult after you cut the whole film. There is an old rule that the person who cuts the film should never cut the trailer. Normally I like to give the middle finger to old rules but that one makes a lot of sense to me. Well, maybe one day when I have kazillion people willing to help…or even one… I’ll give that advice a little more credence. But when it is a one man army, I make due.

In any case, I have trailer that I cut ages ago (before the film was even finished) so I decided to go a little more cinematically heavy handed with this one. The idea is to get the pint across in a way that might appeal to an audience that is slightly audience than the one I have been focused on.

I like the results and hope you do too. The music is a bit loud on some speakers but that was intentional. I tested it out on a bunch of different machines, laptops, imac, bose systems and phones. This mix was one that split the difference the best for each device. What ever you watch it on…I hope it rocks.

Just a reminder to anyone who might be into it.
Upcoming screenings:
Brantford Film Festival Oct 15
Duke City DocFest Oct 10-15
Hamilton Film Festival Nov 5