Vancouver is one of those place that when you’re out on the town in this city, you never know who you might run into—or who might be enjoying a meal at a neighbouring table.
After all, they don’t call this city Hollywood North for nothing.
Case-in-point: British stars Kate Winslet and Idris Elba were reported as being spotted while dining down at False Creek at the Peruvian-Japanese restaurant Ancora on November 29.
They’re in town for the feature film The Mountain Between Us, which launches into production today and continues until February 24.
This is Hany Abu-Assad’s big-screen adaptation of Charles Martin’s novel.
The story follows successful writer Ashley Knox (Winslet) heading to her wedding and Dr. Ben Payne (Elba) returning home after a medical conference. When the two take a charter flight from Salt Lake City, Utah, around a winter storm, the plane crashes in the High Uintas wilderness.
The two survive the crash but are badly injured and face numerous challenges in surviving in and finding their way out of the wild. As they struggle against the odds, their relationship develops into something more intimate.
Meanwhile, as we previously mentioned, the sci-fi flick Parallel, by Mexican filmmaker Isaac Ezban, wraps up today (December 5), after having started production on November 9.
The film stars Martin Wallström and Georgia King as app developers who discover a mirror in the attic of their rented house. The mirror turns out to be a portal to other parallel universes.
When the developers start bringing back knowledge from those other realities, they start to face unexpected consequences.
Among the cast are Alyssa Diaz, Mark O’Brien, and Aml Ameen.
Also shooting is the comedy-horror Dead Shack, directed by Peter Ricq, which began production on November 30 and continues until December 17.
In this Goonies meets Night of the Living Dead story, a 14-year-old boy, his two friends, and his hard-partying parents head to a cottage in the woods for a getaway.
But when the youths witness the neighbouring woman bringing home two dead bodies for her zombie family to eat, their parents don’t believe them.
It’s up to the three teens to figure out how to save their lives.
Elsewhere in the city, although Season 1 of My So-Called Wife was originally scheduled to end production on November 28, it will now wrap up on Wednesday (December 7). The series started on August 29.
But there are more changes afoot.
The dark comedy has been renamed Imposters. It stars Inbar Lavi as Maddie, an identity-shifting con-artist who robs her lovers of valuables and their hearts.
As she pursues her newest mark, she’s being pursued by three former targets (Rob Heaps, Parker Young, Marianne Rendón) and she meets a love interest (Stephen Bishop), who complicates matters even further.
Uma Thurman also makes an appearance as a fixer deployed by the ring-leader of the con-artists to keep his employees in line.
Other TV show concluding before Christmas include The Canadian-American TV production When Calls the Heart ends its Season 4 production next Monday (December 12). It started on August 22.
The series follows Elizabeth Thatcher (Erin Krakow), a teacher from a wealthy family who moves to a small Albertan coal-mining town in 1910.
Although she and RCMP Jack Thorton (Daniel Lissing) had an instant disliking of one another when they first met, they developed a mutual attraction to one another as the town faces various challenges and dramas, including a landslide in Season 3.
More productions are wrapping up over the next few weeks as we head into the holiday season.
Check in back next week for more of what’s shooting, and what’s leaving town, in Hollywood North.