Toronto's Filmport just what industry wants: Cronenberg

The largest and most modern sound stage for shooting TV and film in North America opened Wednesday in Toronto as part of the inauguration of the city's huge Filmport project.

The 4,270-square-metre building is one of seven sound stages in Filmport, a site that Toronto hopes will be a magnet for the film, video and digital media industries.

The TV and movie studio, on Toronto's neglected port lands, is the first phase of what the city hopes will be a creative hub that draws filmmakers from all around the world.

Filmport, a public-private partnership backed by investment from Sam Reisman and Paul Bronfman and to be managed by Toronto Film Studios, has been five years in the making.

It arose out of a Toronto Economic Development Corp. (TEDCO) study five years ago that determined the city was missing out on large film shoots because it lacked dedicated production facilities.

The two studios previously in operation in Toronto were converted warehouses, lacking the large expanses of pillar-less space that can be provided by Filmport. Nor was there additional studio space for if several films needing studio space at one time.

"We have not had the large spaces for Hollywood films that we need to attract more projects to Toronto," said Jeffrey Steiner, president of TEDCO. "What Filmport has done is provide exactly what Hollywood studios have asked for — a controlled space to do shooting."

The seven sound studios that were unveiled Wednesday, made of 25-centimetre thick concrete with a foam core and padded with a sound-absorbing material called Insul-Quilt, allow filmmakers to shoot without being interrupted by outside noise or any sound reverberations.

The studios are wired to power high-wattage film lights and other equipment, and the 12-metre ceilings allow room for lights high above the sets. Filmport also has a large, secure internet line that filmmakers can use to transmit special effects, digital footage and other electronic information anywhere in the world.

The fly in the ointment has been the film industry, which is shooting very few projects in Canada at the moment.

It's not just the high dollar that's driving production away — a writer's strike earlier this year forced the postponement of hundreds of projects, and the current labour difficulties with the Screen Actors Guild in Hollywood have further delayed production.

"We brought a group of producers from of Hollywood's biggest studios here earlier this year, and they were very excited by what they saw," said Ken Ferguson, president of Filmport.

"We're going to finalize some of those deals, and I expect something by the end of the year," he said.

So far, no projects have been booked to use the new facilities, some of which are still under construction. 

However, David Cronenberg, the Canadian director of A History of Violence and Eastern Promises, told media and dignitaries gathered at the opening that Filmport is just what the film industry wants.

"I'm here representing an eager, salivating customer," he said.

"It's exciting for film people … to look at all the details of the buildings, these structures — the electrics, the electronics, the lack of pillars in the buildings. That's something you don't think about if you're not in the film business, but if a studio is in a converted warehouse, it will have pillars in the way and you have to continually work around them," he said.

The largest of Filmport's studios has an outside structure like the flying buttresses of a cathedral, so no pillars are necessary on the inside.

"I saw that mega-studio and it gets the creative juices going," Cronenberg said. "I can't wait to be in there shooting something, creating something."

Filmport has rights to more than 18 hectares in Toronto's port lands. If the new facilities become busy, there are plans for more sound studios and further development in the area.

"Five years from today, this will be the epicentre of the creative community in Toronto, and Filmport will put us in our rightful place on the world stage," Mayor David Miller said in a speech at the official opening.

The long-term plan is for a huge community devoted to film and TV production, including offices for lawyers, agents and other services, restaurants, theatres and other public areas.