A director from Grand Bend will bring her debut feature film July Talk - Love Lives Here to the Kineto Theatre in Forest on Thursday, July 27, where she will also conduct a question and answer session.
Filmmaker Brittany Farhat chose to make a documentary that follows July Talk, an indie rock band from Toronto, as they planned and performed a drive-in concert in Sharon, Ontario after their tour dates were cancelled early on during the COVID-19 pandemic.
"The music fan in me was just so excited and grateful that there was a band who came up with this idea to make live shows possible in a time that was very difficult to bring people together," she said. "Then the filmmaker in me was just so curious and intrigued about how this was going to work and what motivated them to come up with such a big idea. So that's when I reached out to the band and followed them along on this unprecedented journey."
The project took 18 months to complete.
The film premiered at the 2023 Hot Docs International Documentary Festival, which is North America's largest documentary film festival. Farhat called the experience an honour and "a dream come true."
"I have been travelling with the film all over Canada, it's being distributed with levelFILM," she said. "It's been such an awesome experience getting this film out and sharing it with the country."
Farhat said the film touches on a lot of important topics such as mental health, chronic illness, burnout, social justice, and the importance of safer spaces within the music community.
"Also, just the importance of community and coming together in order to support each other," said Farhat. "I think you can learn how important it is to stay close to your community and check in with each other, and also just enjoy what it is that you do in this life."
Farhat told Sarnia News Today that it took the pandemic for her to reevaluate where she wanted to be and what career path she wanted to take.
"I lived in Toronto for about 10 years after I graduated from Fanshawe College, where I was shooting bands constantly and I made the decision to move back home to Grand Bend in the summer of 2020, where I got the idea for this documentary," she said. "I realized that working in a small town and bringing my projects here was one of the best decisions that I've ever made because I really was able to focus on my craft and give myself the time and space to create in a way that was new and on my own terms."
Farhat said bringing her film to the area is a "full circle moment" for her and she hopes viewers enjoy experiencing live music in a cinematic format.
"It's just so cool that there is a support system and a community who are looking forward to coming out and supporting my first feature film," Farhat said.
"The concerts were just so beautiful and so explosive with energy. [They were] shot with eight beautiful cinema cameras, and with a drone, and with some of the best cinematographers in Canada."
Tickets to see July Talk - Love Lives Here on Thursday, July 27 at 8 p.m. can be purchased on the theatre's website. Farhat will introduce the film and will later host a Q&A after the screening.
Meanwhile, July Talk will be in Sarnia this fall for the Bluewater Health Foundation's Block Party.
