waydowntown

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waydowntown
Directed byGary Burns
Written byGary Burns
James Martin
Produced byGary Burns
Shirley Vercruysse
Starring
Cinematography
Odeon Films
Alliance Atlantis
CTV
Telefilm Canada
Australia:
Madman Entertainment
Release date
September 10, 2000
Running time
87 min.
LanguageEnglish
Budget$700,000 CAD (estimated)

Waydowntown (stylized as waydowntown) is a 2000 film directed by

dark comedy that explores office culture and its effects and often uses surrealism
to achieve its thematic goals.

The film is set in

dark comedy
about Canadian corporate culture.

Plot

The film centres on a group of office colleagues in downtown Calgary, Alberta, who bet a month's salary on who can last the longest without going outside by using

the system of covered walkways that connect the buildings
. The film takes place over one lunch hour on day 24 of the month-long competition. Things start to become complicated as the office prepares for the company founder's retirement party.

The film's title is derived from a particular form of suicide where one smashes the (non-openable) window of one's high-rise office and then jumps through. In the movie, one of the characters has accumulated a 2-litre pop bottle full of marbles in the hopes of breaking his window. The dark joke for this is referenced in the film as: "a 15 bus takes you downtown, [but] a bottle of marbles takes you way downtown."

Cast

Production

The majority of the film was shot in

TD Canada Trust Tower. The low-budget film was shot on digital and later transferred to 35 mm
.

Reception

The film has a 70% freshness rating on Rotten Tomatoes. Most critics praise the satirical elements, casting, and plot. Others find the film to be humourless and incomplete, and the plot to be too nonsensical and uninteresting.[1] The film won the Best Canadian Film Award prize at the 2000 Toronto International Film Festival.[2][3]

In 2001, an industry poll conducted by Playback named it the 10th best Canadian film of the preceding 15 years.[4]

The film was shown at the Calgary International Film Festival on September 19, 2019, to celebrate its 20th anniversary.[5]

In 2023, Barry Hertz of The Globe and Mail named the film as one of the 23 best Canadian comedy films ever made.[6]

See also

References

  1. ^ "Waydowntown". Rotten Tomatoes.
  2. ISBN 9780888644794
    .
  3. Screen Daily
    . Retrieved 20 September 2022.
  4. ^ Michael Posner, "Egoyan tops film poll". The Globe and Mail, November 25, 2001.
  5. ^ "Waydowntown". Calgary International Film Festival. Retrieved November 14, 2019.
  6. ^ Barry Hertz, "The 23 best Canadian comedies ever made". The Globe and Mail, June 28, 2023.

External links

Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Waydowntown&oldid=1209741499"