Cameras roll on Kim Albright’s debut feature
With Love and a Major Organ

(Vancouver BC): Cameras have started rolling on Vancouver-based Canadian-British-Filipina director, Kim Albright’s debut feature film With Love and A Major Organ with regional production funding from Telefilm Canada, along with the WIDC Feature Film Award which includes in-kind sponsorships from screen industry companies across the country.

The off-beat comedy screenplay is written by Julia Lederer, whose award-winning stage play of the same name premiered at the Toronto Fringe Festival, to overwhelming success and toured across North America to cities including Chicago, New York, and Los Angeles.

Set in a world where hearts are made of inanimate objects and people suppress emotions to escape into technology, the story shares the travails of a vibrant young woman who rips out her heart for the man she loves, who promptly disappears with it. Offering flairs of magic realism, With Love and a Major Organ promises to stretch our imaginations as it artfully articulates the courage it takes to be true to your own heart.

The film’s stellar cast includes Anna Maguire (Violation, TIFF 2020), as protagonist Anabel, a compassionate ‘fish out of water’ in an emotionally disconnected society, Hamza Haq (NBC / CTV’s Transplant), as George, the kind but mild-mannered man she feels a rare connection to, and much-celebrated veteran actor, Veena Sood (CTV’s Children Ruin Everything) as Mona, George’s over-protective but brilliant mother whose emotion-suppressing techniques have revolutionized the not so distant world from our own, in which the story is set.

“I’m thrilled to be turning this dream into a reality. It’s taken a lot of hard work from a lot of people to get to this point. I’m really excited by the diverse cast and crew that we’ve assembled”, says director Kim Albright. “The support from the entire team, including funders, sponsors and community, has been tremendous.”

The team is helmed by producer, Madeleine Davis whose previous projects have screened at TIFF, VIFF and SXSW. Executive producers include multi-award-winners, Lori Lozinski (The Body Remembers When the World Broke Open), and Carol Whiteman, co-creator and producer of Women In the Director’s Chair (WIDC). This is the 11th WIDC Feature Film Award film that Whiteman is exec producing. Also of note, this year is WIDC’s 25th anniversary.

Shooting now through to the end of February 2022, With Love and a Major Organ has also been supported in development through the Canadian Film Centre Director’s Lab (2018), the Women In the Director’s Chair (WIDC) Story & Leadership Program (2019), the Whistler Film Festival Praxis Screenwriters Lab (2019) and was shortlisted for the Sundance Feature Film Development Lab (2019). The project received additional development support from the Bell Media Harold Greenberg Fund, and in 2020, Albright received the CBC Films WIDC Talent Development Award which brought award-winning screenwriter Anita Doron (The Lesser Blessed, The Breadwinner) on board as story consultant.

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In Anabel’s world human hearts are made of inanimate objects. Everyone seems detached from their feelings and addicted to their technological devices. But not Anabel. She feels everything and craves connection. When she meets George, a kind but mild-mannered man, she feels a rare bond with another human being. After a series of painful rejections, plus news of her mother’s death, Anabel vows to forgo the perils of living a life too full of feeling. She rips out her heart and sends it to George. Unable to offer anything in return, George, compelled by Anabel’s heart, disappears on a joy ride while Anabel’s world starts to fade. When George’s over-protective mother, Mona, shows up searching for her son, Anabel learns that without a heart of some kind, Anabel won’t survive. Racing against time to set things right, Mona and Anabel find George and Anabel summons the courage to get her own heart back.

Celebrating 25 years of advancing the careers and narrative fiction screen projects of Canadian women directors, Women In the Director’s Chair (WIDC) was founded in 1996/97 through an initial collaboration among ACTRA, the Banff Centre, and Women In Film and Television Vancouver. Over 300 director alumnae working across Canada and around the globe, have directed 1000’s of hours of quality screen entertainment. WIDC is presented with major support from Telefilm Canada, CBC Films, and with the participation and support of ACTRA National, Actra Fraternal Benefit Society, Creative BC, and the Independent Production Fund.

WIDC Feature Film Award is supported by Panavision Canada, Sim Group, Keslow Camera Film and Digital, RAW Camera, William F. White International Inc., North Shore Studios, Company 3, Encore VFX, Elemental Post Production, Kalos Studios, Post Moderne, Walter Lighting & Grip, The Bridge Studios, Vancouver Film Studios, Whites LES, Portable Electric, The Research House Clearances Inc, Descriptive Video Works, Front Row Insurance, National Captioning Canada, Line-21 Media Services Inc., EP Canada, Signal Systems.

WIDC also appreciates community collaborations with the Director’s Guild of Canada, WIFT Vancouver’s International Women in Film Festival, Female Eye Film Festival, St John’s International Women’s Film Festival, Reelworld Film Festival, BANFF, TIFF, VIFF, Crazy 8’s, and the Whistler Film Festival.