Photo: Courtesy of Western Directives
By Colin Budd
The days of fresh faced teenagers developing their games at the junior level are over for the Lloydminster Bobcats. On the big screen at least.
The Alberta Junior Hockey League franchise has been tabbed as the new fictional team for Sure Shot Dombrowski to take over in the Alberta based movie franchise’s third installment, which will be shot around the city in the spring.
Sure Shot Dombrowski is the brainchild of writer/director/producer Tim McKort, who put the first movie out in 2007 with Western Directives Inc. The sequel was shot in January and will be released later in 2010, with the third feature slated to begin shooting in March 2011.
“It’s been really successful,” said McKort. “As a feature film making company you learn so much and you grow so much from your first to your second movie and we feel that the second one is even better than the first. Still a small budget Canadian feature, but in this landscape that we have, pretty successful.”
He says the third one will be the best yet. After shooting the first two in Edmonton and Barrhead respectively, McKort said he was drawn to Lloydminster for a number of reasons, not the least of which was the Wayne Russell ownership group welcoming them with open arms and allowing them to use the Bobcats logo and name in the film.
“It will be Lloydminster – it’s not going to be a fictitious place,” said McKort. “The promotion is pretty big, we’re international with our little movie franchise.”
Lloydminster was chosen because of their arenas and its support of the arts. The business community is also vital because sponsors are featured prominently on the boards during the movie and finance the project in its early stages.
“We have a lot of cool Western Canadian businesses that should be in a hockey movie,” said McKort, adding the boards will be lined with sponsors. “We have a tonne of businesses that get involved because the exposure is cool.”
The first movie of the series was successful in most ways a small budget Canadian film can be. It was entered into a handful of movie festivals and was purchased by Super Channel, giving it exposure everywhere in the country.
“When we did the first one we really connected with a lot of Canadians from coast to coast because the movie played from Dartmouth, N.S. to Victoria, B.C., in select theatres,” said McKort. “And this time around we’re hoping to play in a lot more theatres and have a lot longer run.”
The tale follows Sure Shot Dombrowski, played by Prince Albert comedian Kelly Taylor, a rough and tumble hockey player who made his way through the ranks and just can’t seem to have his life running smoothly, whether it’s on or off the ice.
“He has all this history, he never quite gets it right. He always has problems, he’s always scraping out of a mess, but he always manages,” said McKort. “Hockey is his life.”
After playing and coaching in the first two, Dombrowski moves upstairs to take over as the general manager of the Bobcats in the third and starts the rival professional league.
“We get into a lot of political satire, a lot of social satire, a lot of Western Canadian stuff that people can relate to,” said McKort.
Along with Taylor, TV personality Tracie Gray also stars as do comedians Sean Lecomber and Darryl Makk and stage actor Murray Utas. Todd Cherniawky, who has built up a solid resume in Hollywood is the art director.
“Avatar (to) Sure Shot Dombrowski, that’s kind of a reach,” laughed McKort. “But he’s a good Edmonton boy and we know him really well. So we have that kind of expertise that we tap into.”
Cherniawky’s currently working on Transformers 3.
McKort said he expects shooting to take about a week in a few locations around town. When the time draws closer they will be looking for people to fill roles as extras.