Bravo!Fact and the film "Becoming"

Toronto –based Bravo! FACT (under executive director Judy Gladstone) was established in 1995 as an offshoot of the cable arts television network Bravo! The anagram FACT stands for “A Foundation to Assist Canadian Talent”, and to that end, the organization has handed out literally millions of dollars to makers of short films. I’ve been privileged to sit on the quarterly juries and can attest to the hundreds of applications that pour in, and the careful way the grants are dispensed to projects of imagination, integrity and quality. Categories cover an eclectic mix of dance, drama, animation and spoken word. The weekly Sunday show “Bravo!FACT Presents” (with repeats on Friday) screens finished films, usually themed together. The foundation also tours film programs around the country.

Bravo! FACT shorts have won Emmy Awards, and been nominated for Oscars and Canadian Comedy Awards. They have been shown at prestigious film festivals such as Cannes and Sundance, as well as festivals in New York, Japan, Argentina and Italy. The upcoming Toronto International Film Festival (Sept. 10-19, 2009) has selected 11 Bravo! FACTs for its Canadian programming.

The Toronto-based Canadian Film Centre Worldwide Short Film Festival is the largest competition in North America for short films and, as such, is the most significant. (The CFC is the all-important training centre for filmmakers established by distinguished director Norman Jewison). At the recent 15th festival (Jun. 16-21, 2009) the Bravo! FACT grant film “Becoming” won Honourable Mention in the Best Emerging Canadian Filmmaker division. To put things in perspective, the festival had 3966 submissions for its 31 programs. Clearly, “Becoming” greatly impressed the jurors.

The creators of “Becoming” are choreographer/filmmaker Ayelén Liberona and director/filmmaker Joseph Johnson Camí. Liberona was born in Toronto to Chilean political refugees. She received an anthropology degree at the University of Toronto, but pursued a career in dance. Liberona moved to New York seven years ago, and spent this past year working in Barcelona with partner Camí. For his part, Camí was born and educated in the United States, but found his inspirational roots in his mother’s native city of Barcelona.

"Becoming" (wanderingeyeproductions.com) was shot in the stunning Grey Sauble Conservation Authority, north-west of Toronto, near the resort town of Owen Sound on Lake Huron. Another location was an obliging farmer’s corn field. “Becoming” is the second of a tetralogy that explores man’s increasing disconnect with nature. The first film “Falling” (trickyproductions.com) had the feminine archetype born from a cocoon, and used movement to depict her transformation through the elements. In “Becoming”, the female creature encounters “man”.

When I think back to the original dancefilms, I remember static depictions of staged performances. Director Norman Campbell was among the first to take dance off the stage into a studio to give a 3-dimensional perspective to the art form. In the intervening years, dancefilm has grown up as the camera has found infinite imaginative ways to capture dance. As such, “Becoming” is clearly on the cutting edge of filming site specific dance that also includes animation. Camí calls “Becoming” a technical ballet of camera movement. It was shot with a mostly Canadian cast and crew.

Carlos Lascano’s animation involves the fireflies, which the filmmakers see as the wise keepers of what is left of the forest. Dancer Jessica Keeling is Idolamantis (based on the praying mantis), an ancient and dangerous archetypal woman, and because man is swallowing up forests which brings his world closer to hers, Idolamantis can cross the portal to his fields for a showdown. Colin Penman’s body make-up is absolutely phenomenal. He has transformed Kelling into a mini-dinosaur with dragon-back fins and scaly skin – yet she still looks absolutely alluring and beautiful. It is, in fact, the animated fireflies that stimulate Idolamantis to movement, and are the source of light that bathes her in an ethereal glow.

The camera work of cinematographer Guy Godfree is magnificent. The beginning images of “Becoming” sweep across a mysterious, blue/green forest lake, then follow a rushing river through a rocky gorge. The camera is our point of view as if we were actually in the water. One supposed rock is the helmeted headdress of Idolamantis who emerges from the water like a nightmare version of Botticelli’s "Birth of Venus".

As a choreographer, Liberona has always been intensely physical, and she has given Keeling a combinations of gymnastics and animal imagery to depict her fantastical progress through nature. One gorgeous long shot has her capering on the edge of rock cliff above a plunging waterfall. Another low angle shot captures her cartwheels through the forest. The arch of an old stone bridge becomes a cave of smoke and shadows which represents her movement through the portal that separates her world from mankind. Mention should be made of Rubin Kodheli’s music and Richard Cavagin’Carey’s soundscape, a brilliant fusion of the voices of nature intermixed with menacing eerie chords and arpeggios.

We hear Man before we see him. The sounds of his machete cutting corn are background to the flow of the camera across the innocent-looking, orderly fields. Man (actor Sanford Kong), is garbed in old jeans with a rope for a belt. Barefoot and bare-chested, he is the epitome of the archetypal peasant, straining at making his living. The camera work that follows Man is wonderful – his alert freezing at hearing something in the fields – the close-up of his face, his tense body. The great shock for Man (and for the viewer) is Idolamantis caught in mid-air as she literally comes in for a landing on top of him. (Apparently the filmmakers schlepped a trampoline into the corn to make this dramatic and terrifying first glimpse of Idolamantis by Man).

What follows is an erotic yet vicious duet for two charismatic performers. They first lock eyes in close up – then the battle commences in the clearing of the cornfield. Liberona has given Keeling choreography that entwines around Kong’s body, and the camera lovingly follows her twists and turns as she literally consumes him in her physicality. With one horrific cry, she breaks his neck, and that sound is heart-stopping. She is the revenge of nature embodied in one timeless metaphor. The film ends with a shot that first focuses on Man’s lifeless body, then follows the back of Idolamantis as she enters the corn stalks and is completely camouflaged. Another note should be made of Tom Khan’s tight editing which captures the tension of the story from its mysterious beginning to its dismal conclusion. There is not one gratuitous shot in the film, be it slow motion or fast action.

Liberona and Camí are the writers, producers and directors, and their moody vision has produced a compelling 8-minute film of life and loss that rivets the eye. Man in his cornfield lies dead. We have pushed nature to the limit and she is fighting back. The slinky, seductive, reptilian Idolamantis wins the day.