The idea of a homegrown movie on the subject of ever-expanding Toronto indie rock collective Broken Social Scene is nothing really new. As far back as 2003, Toronto music writer Stuart Berman was making his own documentary on the group (we know, we interviewed BSS at the time and were caught doing so on his cameras). That film still seems to be a work-in-progress, but Berman — a longtime friend of the group — did write and just release, This Book Is Broken earlier this month (July 1), an intimate lively oral history of the band.
Well, it seems like a quasi companion piece to that book is being made in a film titled, “This Movie is Broken,” only this time its being directed by Canadian filmmakers Bruce McDonald (“Pontypool”) and Don Mckellar (“Last Night,” the cult TV show, “Twitch City“) according to Toronto-based film site Twitch (not that quasi either, the film poster and the book cover are essentially of the same aesthetic)
What’s more, the concert doc — like say, The Beastie Boys’ “Awesome, I Fuckin’ Shot That” live doc — will rely heavily on UGC, or CGC: crowd generated content. BSS are encouraging fans to shoot them live in concert — which happened recently at a massive free show at Toronto’s Haborfront — and send in their footage for consideration in the doc. A narrative about two kids trying to get backstage will run throughout the film (Twitch has the synopsis), but its not known yet who will play the fans. Our guess would be local talent. How about Ellen Wong from “Scott Pilgrim Vs. The World”? She newly discovered talent, no?
BSS are no stranger to film having already been involved in over half a dozen movie projects (“Snow Cake” with Sigourney Weaver, “Half Nelson” with Ryan Gosling), nor are they unfamiliar to McDonald who tapped them to write the score and new songs to his 2008 film, “The Tracey Fragments” starring Ellen Page (they also wrote the score to McDonald’s TV movie, “The Love Crimes of Gillian Guess,” that never came out as a proper film as originally planned).
Broken Social, or at least its de facto leader Kevin Drew is also helping out with music to the aforementioned ‘Scott Pilgrim‘ (rumored now confirmed to be making the noise bursts to Crash & The Boys) and he also directed a short film starring Cillian Murphy (“Batman Begins”) and Feist earlier this year. It seems inevitable that Drew will eventually be making his own features. MacDonald also shot a short documentary about BSS member Brendon Canning for his solo album from last year that was supposed to air on Canadian television (anyone see it?). BSS will be seen next onscreen during a wedding sequence of “The Time Traveler’s Wife” where they’ll play a lo-key cover of Joy Division’s “Love Will Tear Us Apart.” That film hits August 14.
“This Movie Is Broken” presumably won’t be ready until sometime in 2010 though production is started now, so it is conceivable they could bang it out before the year’s over. BSS are currently working with Tortoise’s John McEntire in Chicago on their fourth album. Crowd-shot cameras are getting better and better. Here’s some evidence of video via Pitchfork, who are so impressed they say, “seriously, can everyone making amateur YouTube concert videos just get this dude’s camera, please?”