Actor and producer Chad Willett talking to actor Scott Hylands for their film Becoming Redwood. Photo courtesy of Chad Willett

Two B.C.-born, Vancouver-based film-makers are turning heads at this year’s Vancouver International Film Festival.

Actor and producer Chad Willett, 41, is showing his latest film Becoming Redwood, which just took Best Canadian Feature at the Edmonton International Film Festival.

The film follows the story of 11-year-old Redwood Forest Hanson. When his father is arrested, young Redwood is sent from B.C. to California to live with his estranged mother, two half-brothers, a red-neck stepfather, and an elderly, agoraphobic step-grandfather.

The film allows audiences in to Redwood’s soaring imagination where he lives a brightly coloured fantasy of beating the world’s best golfer, freeing his father from jail and reuniting his parents.

Willett plays Redwood’s draft dodging, dope-dealing, hippie father.

Speaking on the phone while he was excitedly awaiting news of the arrival of his first-born, Willett reveals his first aspirations were not nearly as creative as Redwood’s. He had the relatively standard dream of becoming a firefighter. It wasn’t until he was about 15 years old that he wanted to become an actor.

Kristine Cofsky in In No Particular Order. Photo by Allison Kuhl

But the dream was ever-present for Kristine Cofsky, actor and first time screenwriter-director of In No Particular Order, in which she stars as Sarah, the 20-something main character.

Cofsky, 29, wanted to be an actress for as long as she can remember.

“My sister and I used to dress up in ball gowns made from bed sheets on Oscar day and prepare acceptance speeches to deliver,” she says.

Barmaid by night, barista by day, Sarah is suspended in a quarter-life crisis. She can’t understand her newlywed sister’s choice of monogamous monotony, instead following a self-destructive (but often hilarious) path of meaningless encounters, hangovers and lowered expectations.

E-mailing back and forth during a break on set from another film, Cofsky says parts of the film are autobiographical (but she won’t tell which).

Like Sarah, Cofsky was working in the bar industry for a long time wondering what she was doing with her life.

“I was wasting years of my life with not a lot of purpose or forward movement,” she says.

Despite being Cofsky’s first film, the making of In No Particular Order was remarkably smooth.

“The shoot itself was honestly quite dreamy,” she says.

However there were times when it seemed like it would never get off the ground for financial reasons.

“It is definitely difficult as a first-time filmmaker to get funding, especially when nothing in your script blows up, or no one gets stalked by an axe wielding psychopath,” Cofsky says.

Willett explains that it’s a Catch 22: film-makers have to prove how good they are to get funding but need funding to prove how good they are.

Even with his extensive 20-year career in film and television, Willett still had to convince investors for Becoming Redwood.

“It’s never straight forward when you’re dealing with money,” he says.

Knowing her film was not going to be considered “commercial”, Cofsky was prepared to work without grants. She funded the film herself in conjunction with a small online campaign which attracted support from friends, family and the industry.

The process was a difficult one and Cofsky had to work extremely hard to ensure her debut was a success. But as Willett puts it, anything worthwhile is not easy.

The Vancouver International Film Festival runs until October 12. Visit www.viff.org for details.