Jessica Hall’s joyful, poetic documentary about family and reaching your potential
Jessica realized that first of all “these women are hilarious,” and secondly that “they would make a great, great subject for a short film.”
Every Saturday morning, Katherine Hall is out with her mum, Frances, scouring local shops in search of items to support their favourite pastime: building and renovating dollhouses. Katherine has an intellectual disability, but she hasn’t let that stop her from living on her own, working full time, or doing anything else she sets her mind to.
One Saturday morning, Frances and Katherine, along with her sister Jessica, are taking time out from their routine to talk to me about their film, Saturday, which was directed by Jessica and produced by the National Film Board of Canada (NFB).
The idea for the film came to Jessica one Saturday when her mum and sister invited her to join them on their weekly excursion. As she sat in the back seat of Frances’ car listening to their banter from the front, Jessica realized that first of all “these women are hilarious,” and secondly that “they would make a great, great subject for a short film.”
In 2022, Jessica pitched the idea to the NFB at the Available Light Film Festival’s industry forum. NFB executive producer Shirley Vercruysse thought the film was a good fit.
Another producer, Teri Snelgrove, was brought on board to helm the project, and it progressed through various development stages, culminating in what Jessica describes as an “intimidating” but successful “green light” meeting in Montreal. Snelgrove and Jessica put together a crew from the film community, including director of photography Peter Planta, editor Hart Snider, Whitehorse local Jordy Walker, who did sound design and original music, and several others.
While much of the filming followed Katherine and Frances on their weekly expedition, Jessica was also interested in exploring the story further by incorporating Super 8 footage from the family’s film archives, as well as making some cinematic magic with Frances and Katherine’s dollhouses.
“I wanted to play with different storytelling techniques, so the observational film where I follow them around on their Saturday, and then through the tabletop — the miniature dollhouse piece. And then the third part is the archival.”
The observational doc
At the heart of Saturday is the interaction between Katherine and Frances. The observational approach was Jessica’s original vision for the film, to allow them to “do their natural thing.” Fortunately, they are both comfortable when it comes to being on camera, and are accustomed to being directed by a family member.
“I’d been filmed for many years by my husband so I know a lot of things, like how you’re not supposed to look at the camera and stuff like that,” Frances explains. “So does Katherine, so it was easy.”
One of the funniest exchanges between them takes place while they ride in the car and discuss what Frances had put on her bagel at breakfast, butter or olive oil-based margarine.
Their good-natured banter reminds me of a scene in a buddy movie. Jessica explains that for this shot, the film crew hid the camera and left Katherine and Frances “to their own devices.”
“It was a funny shot,” Frances admits, sounding a bit surprised with her own comical chops. “I didn’t know how we sounded together. I really didn’t know that.”
Frances and Katherine’s quest for dollhouse supplies takes them to various Whitehorse haunts, including Home Hardware, Tara Kolla’s Wish Factory, Well-Read Books, the Love2Thrift Community Thrift Store (which isn’t seen in the film) and the Ridge Pub in Granger for lunch and a pint.
“In most of my work, I try to feature local music, local locations, local people,” Jessica explains. “I think it’s important that if you’re telling a Yukon story, that you make it as Yukon as possible.”
The archival footage
The Hall family films are not your average home movies. Both Frances and her husband, John, are adept filmmakers who have captured the family’s lives since the children (Katherine, Jessica and their sister, Elizabeth) were very young.
“It’s very strong,” Jessica says of her parents’ Super 8 films.
“Every single moment in our family footage is something you can build onto in terms of a scene, you can really tell many different stories with it because you’ve got all this beautiful footage. So I wanted to include that because the theme is family, this is where we come from.”
Through Frances’ voiceover and the gorgeous colour footage, we learn about the family’s move from England to Hong Kong and eventually to Canada where, Frances had heard, they would find some of the best schools for a child with special needs. The footage also introduces us to a young Katherine.
“My husband got the job in Hong Kong, so we took the whole family including the horrible dog [a Dalmatian named Cassandra] with us to Hong Kong, because we were all family,” Frances recalls. “And then there was no real hiccup about getting from Hong Kong to Canada, but there could have been.”
The potential hiccup Frances refers to is the Canada Immigration Act’s excessive demand clause.
“If the border agent or the person you’re dealing with at the border decides that anyone in your family might have an excessive demand on social services, including special education, they could deem your family not fit and not allow you to enter,” Jessica explains. “And it’s really subjective, it’s who you get at the border, so it’s not necessarily evenly enforced.”
The young family travelled to Canada undeterred and entered the country without incident. Still, there were other challenges in Canada. Frances was confounded with some of the professionals advising her on all the things that Katherine would never be able to do, such as ice skate, when in fact she could already ice skate, and ride a bicycle to boot.
“You’re always proving people wrong, aren’t you, Katherine?” Frances asks her daughter.
“Yeah,” Katherine agrees softly.
The dollhouses
Saturday opens with a street scene made from several of Katherine and Frances’ dollhouses. The scene is not only beautifully shot, but it also speaks to the film’s themes and sets the tone for the audience of what’s to come.
“The film is about many things,” Jessica says, when I ask her about the dollhouses. “It’s about milestones. It’s about, you know, reaching your potential. It’s about family. And we wanted it to feel friendly and light and magical. We wanted people to feel warm and welcome to it as soon as they turned it on.
“So the opening shot was really important and I have to credit [my director of photography] Peter with the approach we took because we brought all the dollhouses that we could bring down [to the Old Fire Hall, where the scenes were shot] and we assessed them. He came up with the street scene idea.”
The dollhouse scene is one of Frances and Katherine’s favourites.
“Some of those houses are my houses in the street, and some of them are Katherine’s,” Frances says. “And then Katherine’s big house at the end. I was quite impressed with it, I thought “God they did a good job with that!” It’s amazing what the camera can do with it, isn’t it?”
There are other truly magical moments that happen in the dollhouse, including one involving a 3-D printed movie projector and a screen that Jessica crafted from paper, some black tape and a Bic pen; a photograph that comes to life; and seemingly giant hands placing photos in the dollhouse. Some of these special effects were contributions from the crew, like editor Hart Snider.
“I would make another film with exactly the same team, 100 percent,” Jessica says. “Good people, really skilled, and really kind, which I think is important.”
The response
Saturday has been screened for Yukon audiences three times: twice at the Available Light Film Festival, at the Yukon Film Society’s Canadian Films Week, and at the Dawson City International Short Film Festival at Easter. Since its Yukon screenings, Frances and Katherine are being recognized by Yukoners who have seen the film.
“I went to vote, early voting, and one of the young ladies who was doing all the clerking things, she was like ‘Oh, you’re the lady with the dollhouses in the movie. I really enjoyed that movie!’” Frances recalls. “I was like, ‘Thank you, complete stranger!”
“I get approached at work, by my co-workers,” says Katherine, “They really, really enjoyed [the] movie a lot. And one of my co-workers went to Dawson recently to see my movie.”
Winning over Yukon audiences is one thing; showing a film outside the territory is something else. In March, Jessica travelled to Powell River, B.C., to attend the screening of Saturday at the Qathet International Film Festival.
“It played… ahead of a feature and the applause was very enthusiastic and lots of hooting and hollering and this person came up to me after the screening and said ‘You know, everyone claps at the shorts, but nobody claps like that. People really like your film.’ So this was really nice, because people don’t know me at all [in Powell River]. It’s not even a Yukon-based thing at all, so it was really encouraging and lovely to know that this is touching people and making them cry a little bit.”
Katherine’s day
Before I leave, I’m granted a tour of the main dollhouse featured in Saturday. It’s wonderfully decorated with an eclectic assortment of objects — tiny books, a miniature oven, a cat figurine, a few arcade games — that Katherine has collected.
“We don’t care that much about anachronisms,” Frances says of their approach to decorating. “They’re supposed to be Victorian dollhouses but you’ll find a television or a regular phone.”
I’m not surprised. If there’s anything I learned in the hour I spent with the Halls, it’s that they don’t believe in doing what’s expected, particularly when it comes to all the things that Katherine is capable of accomplishing. She’s most proud of owning her own house, which she shares with Jessica and a cat named Fred.
In honour of the film, Teri Snelgrove gave Katherine, Frances and Jessica matching silver necklaces that spell Saturday. They are all wearing them the day that I’m visiting which is, of course, a Saturday.
“It’s an important day,” Frances says. “It’s Katherine’s day. Saturday.”Saturday will be available for streaming in both English and French at NFB.ca/film/Saturday and from the free NFB app starting May 16. All NFB content is commercial-free.
[Ed.Note: It has just been announced that Saturday has been awarded an honourable mention in the Made in the Yukon (MITY) Professional Award category at the Dawson City International Short Film Festival]
