P.E.I. film a purr-fect fit for New York festival

An Island-made short film called Furball about a self-centred cathas been accepted to be part of a unique film festival in New York City.

It's called the Cat Film Festival and features movies about you guessed it,cats.

Jason Rogerson wrote and directed the film and before starting productionknew nothing about the Cat Film Festival, he said.

"I didn't know it until I made this film or started to plan to make this film," he said.

After the film screens at the festival in November it will travel to over 50 cities across North America.

"The protagonist of the film is an actual live cat, which was daunting to begin with to attempt to start writing that," Rogerson said.

Script change

The film follows Furball and his roommate Norman, Rogerson said.

"They have their patterns, but Furball wants all of Norman's attention. And when Norman has an opportunity forpotentiallya new relationship,Furball is reluctant to encourage that," he said.

Initially the script was designed to talk about some of the "badthings" going on in the world today.

"I just wanted to have this positive outlook, a cat who notices things like 'Hey, don't miss out on the good things in the world,'" Rogerson said.

Unfortunately, that story didn't have a lot of "dramatic tension,"he said.

Casting a cat

To cast the cat he was originally looking for something unique, but as the script changed he said he wanted to cast a "normal looking cat."

He put posters up around town asking people to submit pictures of their feline friends.

"Some people sent me some really interesting pictures, thank you for that, sorry I didn't cast your cat. In the end I just ended up going with my girlfriend's cat," he said.

It was a cat he had regular access to and could start to train it. He said he got the cat to focus on the camera by ringing bells.

"It went pretty well."

He said the cat speaks through voice over, but not in the style of the film Babe.

"I didn't have the budget for the moving mouth," Rogerson said.

Screens on P.E.I.

The short film is just over six minutes long.

Rogerson said he's happy his film was accepted tothe Cat Film Festival and is excited for it to travel across North America.

"It just gives me a lot of pride in the P.E.I. film industry and the team to be able to showcase this in front of so many people," he said.

"It's going to get a lot of play across the states when it plays in all these cites next year that's very exciting."

Furball will also open the Charlottetown Film Festival on Oct. 25.

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