London South Collegiate Institute Alumni

My name's Ethan Hickey, and I'm a 19-year-old filmmaker in London, Ontario.

When I was 17, I hardly called myself a filmmaker. I made films in classes at school, and that's about it. But then I was told about the Youth Forest City Film Festival. I was intrigued by it, so I went out and made five films over the next few months, submitting them all to the festival. Three of my films got in, something my family and I were so excited about. I brought my girlfriend plus my family plus my six of my best friends to the festival. We got all dolled up, and were excited for the night to begin.

During the festival, I placed second place in the Narrative Category for 'Night Moves', I won the Pitch Category for 'Becoming Men', and won the Connor Kalopsis Most Enterprising Filmmaker Award. This was the first time in my filmmaking career that I got recognition from anyone besides my friends and family. The success I had at the festival gave me the confidence to pursue a career in film, and continue to make films.

The following year, I set out to write my first feature. I was only 18, but I knew what I wanted to do, and that was to make movies. I didn't have much money, nor would anyone invest the big bucks in me. So, I wrote a script and then made a proof of concept film, based on the feature. My thinking was, if I could film just one or two scenes from the film, I could get the interest of grant-officers and investors.

In 2020, I shot Catch-22, a no-budget short film I wrote, which I shot with my DP and an actor who didn't get a role in my proof of concept that was set to shoot later that summer. We submitted the film to the Forest City Film Festival, and we sadly didn't get in. Dorothy wrote me a nice email saying the film was good and it was just a tough year of competition, and I told her I'd be back, and I needed to be better.

Later that summer, I directed my two proofs of concept, BURDEN and BURDEN II. I was excited to submit them to the festival, but sadly missed the deadline. But I knew I'd submit in 2021.

During the Forest City Film Festival later that year, they hosted a Breakfast With Mentors industry session. I selected my 'mentors' and joined in. During one of the meetings, I actually saw that Mark Weeden, a filmmaker who had a film at the festival, was also participating in the session. I interrupted the zoom call and asked if I could speak with him one-on-one some time about his journey making a feature. We had a great chat and we still keep in touch. He gave me a bunch of suggestions on what to do regarding funding and shooting a feature, all things that have helped me to this day.

During another mentor session, I met Paige Murray from CBC. She spoke about Canada Reflections, a program that financially supported short filmmakers in Canada. I immediately shot Paige an email, pitching my two shorts, BURDEN and BURDEN II. I anxiously waited for a response, but one never came.

Fast forward to February of 2021, their management changed and Micah over at CBC reached out to me randomly, saying that Canada Reflections had an interest in acquiring my short films. Within days, I had sold them to CBC.

And now, in March of 2021, I'm in pre-production for the feature film version of my shorts, BURDEN, and because of the shorts I made, we've raised almost $200,000 in funding, cast the film, crew'd up, and are going to camera in June of 2021.

Without the Youth Forest City Film Festival, I could not have gotten the confidence to go out there and shoot the shorts that eventually got me through the doors of investors and producers. Without the Breakfast With Mentors session at the Forest City Film Festival, I would've never heard about Canada Reflections, making me lose out on close to $10,000, along with having the support of CBC, one of Canada's biggest media companies.

I thank Dorothy Downs, and the entire team over the Forest City Film Festival, for making this all happen. I owe them so much, and I promise to make them and the City of London proud throughout my career as a filmmaker.

Thank you,

Ethan Hickey

H.B. Beal Secondary Student