Wexford Plaza | |
---|---|
Directed by | Joyce Wong |
Written by | Joyce Wong |
Produced by | Harry Cherniak Matt Greyson Joyce Wong |
Starring | Reid Asselstine Darrel Gamotin |
Cinematography | Maya Bankovic |
Edited by | Darby MacInnis |
Distributed by | levelFILM |
Release date |
|
Running time | 80 minutes |
Country | Canada |
Language | English |
Wexford Plaza is a 2016 Canadian comedy-drama film directed by Joyce Wong and starring Reid Asselstine and Darrel Gamotin. [1]
The film centres on Betty (Reid Asselstine), a lonely young woman who takes a job as a security guard at a strip mall in the Scarborough area of Toronto, and becomes attached to Danny (Darrel Gamotin), a bartender in the mall. [2] Midway through, however, the film shifts to Danny's perspective, retelling the building of their relationship from his side. [3]
The cast also includes Francis Melling, Ellie Posadas, Mirko Miljevic, Mitchell Jaramillo and Ann Paula Bautista.
Although the mall in the film is similarly named to Toronto's real-life Wexford Heights Plaza, the film was actually shot at a closed strip mall in North York. [4]
The film premiered at the Torino Film Festival in 2016, [5] and screened at several film festivals throughout 2017 before having its commercial premiere in Canada in November 2017. The Toronto Film Critics Association named the film as a finalist for the Rogers Best Canadian Film Award at the Toronto Film Critics Association Awards 2017. [6] It was a finalist for the John Dunning Discovery Award at the 6th Canadian Screen Awards. It won the Best Narrative Feature award at the San Diego Asian Film Festival 2017. [7]
Wexford is a neighbourhood in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It is located in the eastern part of the city, on the western end of the district of Scarborough, spanning Lawrence Avenue East between Victoria Park Avenue and Birchmount Road. There are many persons of Greek heritage in this neighbourhood. The Wexford Heights Business Improvement Area boasts 245 members and hosts an annual street festival on Lawrence.
The Golden Mile is a commercial district in the Scarborough district of Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Situated along Eglinton Avenue East, east of Victoria Park Avenue, it was one of Canada's first model industrial parks. The original Golden Mile of Industry ran along Eglinton from Pharmacy Avenue east to Birchmount Road.
Clement Virgo is a Canadian film and television writer, producer and director who runs the production company, Conquering Lion Pictures, with producer Damon D'Oliveira. Virgo is best known for co-writing and directing an adaptation of the novel by Canadian writer Lawrence Hill, The Book of Negroes (2015), a six-part miniseries that aired on CBC Television in Canada and BET in the United States.
The Canadian Screen Award for Best Achievement in Editing is awarded by the Academy of Canadian Cinema and Television to the best Canadian film editor in a feature film. The award was presented for the first time in 1966 as part of the Canadian Film Awards, and was transitioned to the new Genie Awards in 1980. Since 2012 it has been presented as part of the Canadian Screen Awards.
The Toronto Youth Shorts Film Festival is a showcase of short films, video art and new media projects held during the summer in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. All work is made by young people living in the Greater Toronto Area. While the festival used to be open to those aged 18–28, it has now opened its submission call to those aged 14–28.
Werewolf is a 2016 Canadian drama film directed by Ashley McKenzie and starring Andrew Gillis and Bhreagh MacNeil. It marks McKenzie's feature film directorial debut. The film premiered at the 2016 Toronto International Film Festival, and subsequently received numerous accolades, including several Canadian Screen Award nominations, and the $100,000 Toronto Film Critics Association prize for best Canadian film of the year in 2017.
Ashley McKenzie is a Canadian director, screenwriter, and editor. She is known for her feature film directorial debut Werewolf (2016), which won numerous accolades, including the $100,000 Toronto Film Critics Association prize for best Canadian film of the year.
Catherine Hernandez is a Canadian writer, whose debut novel Scarborough was a shortlisted finalist for the 2017 Toronto Book Awards and the 2018 Edmund White Award.
Danny in the Sky is a Canadian drama film, directed by Denis Langlois and released in 2001. The film stars Thierry Pépin as Danny, a model who works as a stripper in gay strip clubs despite being heterosexual. Raised in a dysfunctional family as the son of a closeted gay father and a mother who died of a drug overdose, he is seeking deeper love and meaning in his life but struggles to find people who value him for anything more than his good looks.
Bretten Hannam is a Canadian screenwriter and film director.
Hamza Haq is a Canadian actor, best known for his leading role in the television series Transplant.
Joyce Wong is a Canadian film director and screenwriter from Toronto, Ontario, known for her work in film and television. She is most noted for her debut feature film Wexford Plaza, which was a shortlisted finalist for the John Dunning Discovery Award at the 6th Canadian Screen Awards, and for the Rogers Best Canadian Film Award from the Toronto Film Critics Association.
Beans is a 2020 Canadian drama film directed by Mohawk-Canadian filmmaker Tracey Deer. It explores the 1990 Oka Crisis at Kanesatake, which Deer lived through as a child, through the eyes of Tekehentahkhwa, a young Mohawk girl whose perspective on life is radically changed by these events.
Scarborough is a 2021 Canadian drama film, directed by Shasha Nakhai and Rich Williamson. An adaptation of Catherine Hernandez's 2017 novel Scarborough, the film centres on the coming of age of Bing, Sylvie and Laura, three young children in a low-income neighbourhood in the Scarborough district of Toronto, as they learn the value of community, passion and resilience over the course of a school year through an after-school program led by childhood educator Ms. Hina.
Shasha Nakhai is a Filipino-Iranian Canadian film director, most noted as codirector with Rich Williamson of the 2021 film Scarborough. The film won the Canadian Screen Award for Best Picture, and Nakhai and Williamson won the award for Best Director, at the 10th Canadian Screen Awards in 2022.
Rich Williamson is a Canadian film director, cinematographer and editor, most noted as codirector with Shasha Nakhai of the 2021 film Scarborough. The film won the Canadian Screen Award for Best Picture, and Nakhai and Williamson won the award for Best Director, at the 10th Canadian Screen Awards in 2022.
Ellie Posadas is a Canadian actor from Scarborough, Ontario. She is most noted for her role as Edna in the 2021 film Scarborough, for which she was a Vancouver Film Critics Circle nominee for Best Supporting Actress in a Canadian Film at the Vancouver Film Critics Circle Awards 2021.
Scarborough is the debut novel by Canadian writer Catherine Hernandez, published in 2017. Set in the Toronto district of Scarborough, the novel centres on the coming-of-age of three young children living in the low-income Galloway Road neighbourhood — Bing, a boy struggling with his sexual identity; Laura, a girl who longs for stability as she is continually being shuffled back and forth between her mother's and her father's separate homes; and Sylvie, a girl whose family is living in a homeless shelter — as well as Hina, a community literacy worker who strives to be an oasis of support and guidance for underprivileged children in her community.