What a wild ride 2023 was. I’m so happy to have finished Len & His Spitfire in November of 2022, so that it could spend 2023 on the Festival Circuit. It started out with the premiere in Calgary in March at a grassroots puppet festival that I had taken part in in the past (CAOS Animovies). Then came Dawson City, and Yorkton Film Festival, with a nomination for Best of Sask. And then the Okotoks Film Festival, which was new to me and turned out to be such an amazing festival to attend. I met some awesome filmmakers there, and I was able to visit my old CCS coworkers, who I hadn’t seen since getting laid off together when the pandemic hit in 2020.
Then the icing on the cake happened in October, when Len & His Spitfire received a couple awards at the Saskatchewan International Film Festival.
There were so many obstacles along the road to finishing this film, I felt at times a little like that Friends’ gif where they’re moving the couch in the staircase and Ross is yelling, “PIVOT! PIVOT!”
Back when I started this project, 11 years ago now, I envisioned the narrator being one of my University Film School friends, Paul Crepeau, who had a very specific timbre to his voice. But the day after wrapping the shoot, he tragically passed away at age 61 of a heart attack. That same week, Sarah’s Aunt, who we loved dearly, passed away suddenly from Strep Throat. Those losses hit me pretty hard and so I took a break from creating.
I returned to the project a year later and ended up finishing picture lock. But then came the audio, and I still had no ideas for a new narrator. I spent a few years chipping away at the soundscape creating my own foley, from footsteps to doors shutting. I took a bit of time away again, and concentrated on big life events, ie. working a full-time job to save up for a down payment on a house. Once we got our house, I was laid off due to pandemic cutbacks, so I figured there was no time like the present to get back to filmmaking.
That’s when I decided that I needed my Dad to narrate the film. It only made sense, since he did have a similar 
timbre to his father, Len. He was very apprehensive when I approached him with the request. In fact he downright refused it to begin with! So I printed the script, highlighted his parts, ambushed him in the kitchen with a microphone and told him to just read it like he was reading one of his grandkids a bedtime story (which I don’t know that he had ever actually done before!). I went into the other room, so that he didn’t have to perform in front of anyone, and then just let him do his thing.
Dad was so proud to be able to see the film’s success on the Festival Circuit. For the past decade, he would ask me, every time I came home for a visit, “So how’s Len & His Spitfire coming along?” It was that nagging support that gave me the kick in the pants to finally finish the project. And I’m so glad I finished it when I did, because Dad was able to see it and experience it being shared with the world before sadly passing away in November 2023. I haven’t posted since he passed away because I’ve had a hard time finding the words. He was my number one supporter, and I’m just so sad that he’s gone. It just doesn’t feel real. But I know he would want me to continue.
Below are the festivals I missed announcing at the end of 2023 that Len & His Spitfire was accepted into. I’m just so grateful for this amazing journey that my grandfather’s story has taken me on. Thank you to everyone who has supported me along the way. I see you, and I appreciate you.
Noelle Duddridge 