The Restoration of the "Mind the Gap"

Mind the Gap (1985, Super-8, 5 minutes)

The epic short documentary was more a tone poem than a conventional doc. Images and music to tell a story: taking the TTC (Toronto Transit Commission) subway train to school and about the city.

Slightly earlier that film-school year (1984/85) my fellow crew and I made a Super-8 epic titled The Chase which involved some shooting on the transit system. "Yorkdale" station was featured prominently at the film's beginning; intrigue on the platform was the setup to the story. This experience convinced me that the subway would make an interesting subject for the required first-year "personal documentary". I had no desire to do a dry treatment. My interest in transportation would ensure that the mechanics of moving people about in a city would star front and centre. Also, the subway was convenient since I took it everyday to school. Pearson Airport would be a more problematic shoot. (I love the mechanics of moving people places on aircraft.)

As per the course requirements I had to pitch my film idea to my instructor, Pat. He gave the project the thumbs up after I presented the script, and several storyboard frames illustrating key moments.

I had picked the title Mind the Gap very quickly. The sign "Mind the Gap" was on every subway platform alerting and reminding riders there was a small gap between a parked train and the platform. For my uses it more meant: please be patient, another train will be along shortly.

My first order of business was to obtain a permit to shoot video or film on the TTC — consumer video/film was not really a thing, but anyone who appeared to be recording something more than their Uncle Johnny boarding a train during his visit to Toronto might very well be questioned with a terse: "Do you have a permit?" (Now, of course, there is no other option. One must show a permission slip.) Off I went to the Commission's headquarters to obtain a pass. The public relations officer was a pleasant chap. He asked me what date I wanted it to expire. I said, "April eleventh". He questioned me with, "Are you sure?" Yep. As it turned out....

The shoot was fun. Jonathan, a buddy of mine since high school, agreed to act in Gap: the narrative thread involved a rider rushing to catch his train on time. This we shot at Eglington West station. The light was best there for this sort of thing. The film stock I decided to use for the entire shoot was Kodachrome 40, a relatively 'slow' emulsion rated at 40 ASA.

For the audio mix I visited one of my old high school teachers, Ben, an amateur filmmaker, but one who had a fairly sophisticated Super-8 post production setup at home. First, however, I had the lab put magnetic stripes down the edited film so I could record synchronized-to-picture the music I always had in mind: a cue from the 1979 film, The Great Train Robbery. Jerry Goldsmith's wonderful and propulsive steam locomotive theme was a perfect fit for a electrified subway train. I had somehow known from the get go that this clash-up would work.

(A more complete "Making of" I'll save for another time. I'm enjoying this too much too soon.)

The screening: The instructor was surprised by the end result. Pat said he was expecting something a little different. He appeared to be mildly disappointed. I took this to be a good thing.

After a repeat screening a few days later, Pat said: "I liked it better this time . . . It's a tone poem."

Exactly. It's the better way.

In 2019 I made noises about restoring Mind the Gap. Get it on track, man!

A Monday Morning Smile: Squeak Squeak Squeak

I read that Donald Trump got his military parade, but that the crowd-size was underwhelming.

I had heard a "squeak squeak squeak squeak squeak" but took it to be the creak of his supporters.

Father's Day 2025: H.W. St. Laurent, RCAF / CAF

Athot for the Day: Witnessing a History Replay

So! It looks like a once-great democratic nation is morphing into a fascist state before our very eyes: "die Sturmabteilung der Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika" is in action....

Athot for the Day: On Losers' Row

The Toronto Maple Leafs and the Conservative Party of Canada have something in common....

They both need to be razed, and rebuilt from the ground up.

Sunday Fun: UAPs, UFOs, LOLs

"Unidentified Aerial Phenomena." Perfect. UAP sounds an awful lot like an old film production and distribution company, but maybe that's the joke. Five years ago the U.S. Department of Defense released video footage captured by U.S. Navy fighter jets which seemed to bear out the notion that these objects are something right out of a 1950s UFO flick.

The DoD feels the clips do not reveal anything that might compromise national and planet security. I'm guessing the chiefs and staff couldn't detect any ray-gun turrets protruding from the speeding objects, or anything that might compromise the integrity of the human race.

Do I believe that aliens from another world are visiting us?

Not really.

Not at all.

A friend told me he thinks we're alone in the universe, and he was quite passionate about it.

My reaction was typical. "In this entire universe, we're the only advanced beings?" Knowing that he is a fan of space-themed television shows, I thought I would add a brain buster:

"And there aren't humanoids out there that speak a passable English?"

He smiled at that one. Then he shook his head gently from side to side to reaffirm his earlier point.

I'm of the mindset that possibility breeds probability. We just don't know about one another. These otherworldly intelligent beings are restricted by the same physics that govern us humans.

We will never meet.

A romance will never happen.

We're doomed to a solitary existence.

There will be no "phasers on stun".

We'll have to depend on stellar flicks like (the underwhelming) Close Encounters of the Third Kind and (the brilliant) Starship Invasions to keep us believing....

Fight Forward Not Backward

"Fight forward!"

A talented and hard-working friend falls into the pit of self-doubt. He worked for years in film and television, and after getting turfed from the business he so loved, it came time to try his hand at self-employment. The road may not feel so inviting, but it is inviting.

The hardest-working man I know.

A multi-talented friend: short films in a top film festival; a feature-length film as producer and shooter; a writer; a designer and artist. He's not of the "I work in the film and television business" kind — there are certainly enough of those superstars — but he's a guy who intimidates some, certainly the "I work in the film and television business" superstar kind.

A bump in the road, there will be many, but he will push forth.

They put you down because you can do more than one thing, and well.

Real talent can be scary to those who just get by.

"Fight forward!" Not backward.

 

Film Design: Cosmonaut Costume Test Polaroid

The Polaroid's blank space has nothing written on it, but it should read:

"Cosmonaut flight-suit costume test-fitting, Marty."

I designed this piece of wardrobe for my (unfinished) 35mm short film Hyper-Reality. Two cosmonaut costumes were built, fitted specially for the actors to play them. The above picture was taken in the film studio, here in Toronto, where we were to shoot a few weeks later.

Those readers who are familiar with the 1960 East German/Polish feature film Der Schweigende Stern — "The Silent Star", released as First Spaceship on Venus on this side of the pond — will recognize my flight-suit designs. I based them heavily on that flick's cosmonaut suits. The First Spaceship version I saw on the big screen in Germany when I was a kid: its visualizations and stylings projected at CFB Baden-Soellingen's Astra Theatre had a pretty profound affect on me, certainly when I later designed a film that was not far removed from its aesthetic inspiration.

Designing wardrobe is a lot of fun for me: from my initial noodles, to more detailed drawings, to hiring seamstresses to realize them, it's one of my favourite parts of film design. (For the flick in question, my partner, Tim, and I rummaged around all the wonderful shops in Toronto's Kensington Market. We found some terrific outfits in Value Village, too.)

I've long said that "film is architecture". If a script calls for original design work, it's something I attack with great enthusiasm. Considering that it's an independent short film, "Hyper-Reality: The Unfinished Motion Picture" is loaded with design work. A few years ago I joked with my brother: "If I can't design something and send it to the mill to be built, what's the point of making a film?"

It's time to get back to the drawing tablet.

Postscript: When I was in my late teens I asked my mother if she could teach me on how to use her Singer sewing machine. The funny thing is she didn't seem to be too taken aback with my request and wasted no time in proceeding to train me on the essential operations in a clear and easy to understand manner. However, while I can be pretty handy with a sewing machine and fabric shears— especially so given the fact that I'm a straight guy — I leave the actual building to seamstresses.

Pencil Sketch: Sea Thing (On the Beach)

Like many self-proclaimed artists, I can, with varying degrees of success, draw what Archie Bunker might call "normal tings": Humans, buildings, oxen pulling plows, and a house cat playing with a ball of yarn. However, I remind myself that I am not afraid to conjure up strange things.

Fastened above is a pencil sketch that I commissioned myself to render in December of 1984. It is titled, simply enough, "Sea Thing (on the beach)". The original is approximately 8" by 8".

Looking at the drawing now, the workmanship doesn't look to be of anything special, even by my own questionable standards, but it is an example of what I can pull out of my hat... well, the subject matter, not the actual subject. Cripes, if I were to pull that out of my hat....

My excuse is that I spent a few of my formative years living in (West) Germany. As anyone would tell you who was in that lovely country back in those days — 1960s/1970s — there was a lot of kids, around my own age, who were physically deformed, some horribly. All thanks to a little drug used to treat "morning sickness", called Thalidomide. Pretty upsetting stuff.

It was very common to see children with flippers for arms, or malformed legs.

I remember driving with my family across the German countryside and my mother blurting out with some emotion, "Oh, look at that little boy, he's horribly deformed". Due to the speed that my dad was driving, I was not able to see anything — probably a good thing. The description my mother gave me was more interesting than anything else. Kids are inquisitive.

And some of them go on to draw and paint. I've drawn more-offbeat things than our featured imaginary denizen of the great big sea....

Yes, "Strange Things from a Strange Mind".

Happy 36th Birthday, SkyDome Forever!

The name "SkyDome" was not my first choice. A contest had been held in 1987, while the structure was under construction, to come up with an appropriate moniker for this new and impressive soon-to-be stadium; the first one with a "fully retractable roof".

Although I never submitted anything, I came up with my own pick very quickly once I heard about the contest: "Trillium." It just happens to be the official provincial flower of Ontario. (Attention, some American readers: Toronto is in the province of Ontario.) In addition, "Trillium" sounds "big" — it does to me, at least.

Once the name for Toronto's new stadium was chosen and announced, I was underwhelmed. "SkyDome? That's totally uninspired." (Totally.)

Now I like that name. It's certainly better than "Rogers Centre". To be honest, most Torontonians don't say "Rogers Centre", and rarely do I hear the stadium referred to by that name unless I'm listening to a Sports news reader on the radio. "Live, down at the Rogers Centre....".

No, "Sky Dome".

 

Post Notes: I survived the SkyDome opening ceremonies back on June 3rd, 1989. There was a contest at work and I won two tickets, so in turn I took my old school mate Jorge to the promised grand event. It turned out to be an all too tacky affair. More than once during the song-and-dance stuff Jorge and I cracked up laughing. He quizzed earnestly to my left ear, "What's with all the Broadway numbers?"

To impress, the dome was then opened. The sky had opened.

Sunday Fun: Starship Invasions Movie Review 1977

In the spring of 1977 — June to be exact — I visited Toronto with friend Chris. Our mission, which we did accept, was to tour OECA (Ontario Educational Communications Authority; now TVOntario). Courtesy of Travelways bus line, and a two five-dollar return tickets, we made our way to the big smoke.

My friend and I took a break from our tour and visited a shop nearby which happened to have a magazine rack loaded with a good spread of material. One particular magazine caught my eye as on the front was a full-sized photo from Star Wars, a movie that I had just heard of a few weeks before. With the help of some unseen force, I bought it.

On the bus ride home I scanned this geek-sweet new magazine; specifically, issue 7 of Starlog. In addition to a rundown on Star Wars were bits and bites on various other science fiction and fantasy movies, one of which was an interesting-sounding film, shot here in Canada, by the name of "Alien Encounter". I can still picture the picture affixed to the blurb: Tiiu Leek and Christopher Lee. "Christopher Lee?" The text said something about "Encounter" being a throwback to 50s sci-fi flicks, but with the advantage of colour photography.

A few months later, Starship Invasions, its new name, was released to a theatre near you. Considering that Star Wars hit the screens a few months earlier and had set the bar for what is expected from "space movies", Starship was fun, with some impressive visual effects. I really dug the effect of a flying saucer crashing at high speed into the First Canadian Place tower (now BMO).

A few weeks after this, friend Chris threw down a copy of Cinema Canada Magazine onto the high school library table where I was seated, specifically opened at the page where Starship Invasions had been reviewed. I reviewed the article and thought it was an honest summation.

Well, dear readers, for those of you who care, for your reading enjoyment above is a picture of a photocopy I made years ago of the story in question. (I found the review while doing research at the magnificent Toronto Reference Library, the Toronto Public Library system's big house on Yonge Street just north of Bloor Street.)

Postscript: the budget figure of one million dollars as itemized in the review is incorrect. (In addition, Douglas Trumbull supervised the visual effects for Close Encounters of the Third Kind, not Star Wars. The reviewer meant John Dykstra.) Someone who worked as a higher-up on Starship Invasions told me that it cost just under two million to produce. Someone else told me that one pet name used by the crew during production was "Alien Turkey".

Canadian Armed Forces Day 2025

I had not realized till minutes ago that here in Canada it's "Armed Forces Day". This was an embarrassing and unconscionable oversight by this proud "Brat".

Once a brat, always a military brat. My father was career RCAF/CAF. My appreciation of our men and women who serve, and who have served, this great country knows no bounds.

The RCAF roundel above is a shoulder patch from my RCAF 100th Anniversary Hoodie, which, incidentally, I wore this morning during my Sunday Tim Hortons coffee pickup. Perhaps I'm not as unconscious as previously thought. Even I can be full of surprises sometimes.