As a filmmaker, please introduce yourself and let us know why you became a filmmaker?

My name is Nicole Benoit. I’m a Director, Writer and Cinematographer. I also fill the roles of Producer, Ep and Editor.

I have been a creator since I was born. A storytelling chatterbox from the time I could speak. I have been passionate about writing

and telling story through visual mediums from an elementary school age. Later, I went to university to study law, business and psychology. Simultaneously I was also creating story in front of the camera as an actor while raising two little ones as a sole provider single mom.

I have lived in Toronto, Los Angeles and New York over my career eventually doing a post grad in marketing and advertising where I went

on to be a Creative Director. I developed a greater drive to be behind the camera. I felt compelled to tell stories about

human experiences which move and effect audiences on a thought provoking, cerebral and emotional level. I moved from

the corporate arts world to film and began writing and directing films with a humanistic, narrative voice at its core.

I’ve been told by others who have experienced my vision and my works, that I have touched them deeply, and have profoundly affected

the way they view the challenges they face in a positive, impactful way. This response has kept me motivated and hungry to create

more stories that are built from diverse worlds filled with complex characters. Flawed relatable characters who all struggle to strike

a balance between the challenges, failings and fears we all experience as universal human truths.

I explore how these human realities are usually in conflict with our deepest desires.

Give some more information about the films you have made so far?

My second film a feature called ‘A Cry in The Dark,’ is still a work in progress. I began shooting it in 2009 where It originated as a film

exploring the five stages of grief and trauma through a young girl’s experiences with acute loss. Rachel, our hero, is 15.

Her family and closest friends face the hard road and heart wrenching journey that cancer inflicts on Rachel’s beloved mother.

The ravaging destruction a devastating illness like this leaves in its wake can manifest in a multitude of ways. Rachel’s father’s inability to cope with her passing results in his own depression and self-destruction and culminates in his subsequent suicide.

The weight of the family’s emotional and mental survival falls on Rachel and her elder brother, Riley’s, shoulders. The story illuminates the responsibilities placed on her incredibly fragile shoulders in the aftermath of this tragedy. She steps into the role of a step-in

mother figure to her her 8-year-old little brother and surviving family. We witness her ultimate sense of failure at living up to what,

in her mind, is her mother’s expectations of her. Tragedy strikes again with her youngest brother while under her care.

We watch the fragile thread of composure and strength holding Rachels grief together, completely unravel.

She subsequently descends into the darkest spaces a human mind and heart can occupy. I was so compelled by the process of

loss and healing; I turned the film into a 12-year journey following Rachel as she grew up and coped with endless cycles of grief.

The 12-year shooting schedule was strategically constructed as a chronicling of her character’s life’s challenges, mapping her

mental state as a product of that pivotal time in her young life. The unique proposition of this films shooting concept,

was to follow the actual actress as she grew from a teenager into a woman in her 20’s and have her reprise the role multiple

times over 12 years. The film is slated to be completed this summer with the final chapter of Rachel at 26 to be shot in July 2020

and is called A Cry In The Dark – The Journals of Rachel Scott. I made a thriller called ‘Lucky Break’ also in running in this festival.

I grew up in a spooky house and am fascinated and terrified of things that go bump in the night. I am still affected by

the psychological mind games shadows, solitude and sound can rock on one’s psyche. Sometimes they are real fears,

others are imagined. Separating which is which leads to fun film concepts that we as storytellers like to embellish and explore.

I made a comedy once. It was actually my very first professional film. As a dramatically inclined storyteller, I have a side which favours an abundance of laughter in my life. I think I’m funny with the right people. Writing a comedy and having it live as such for everyone is the most daunting of all genres. You are constantly doubting yourself and questioning the work, but wait, was that really funny? Lol.