A Visit to Dominic's Film Set

As fate would have it, Dominic Monaghan is here in my home town of Ottawa, Ontario for a few weeks to shoot a movie called The Day. He has been spotted at several well-known Ottawa locations over the past week including Algonquin College and the University of Ottawa (where he held Q&A sessions with students), the National Arts Centre (where he attended a performance of Romeo & Juliet), the Rideau Center shopping mall, a downtown pub, and various restaurants.

This weekend I received a tip that a film crew had closed down a road in the small town of Vars, which is about 20 minutes from my home. Given that film shoots in Ottawa are quite rare, I threw a few LOST items (including Charlie's pants) into my car and drove there with my daughter to check out the situation. Despite the clouds and rain, this was an opportunity I didn't want to miss.

Although there was indeed a film shooting in Vars, it was not The Day. It was instead a film called La Sacrée, touted as the very first Franco-Ontarian comedy. Coincidentally (and I love this coincidence given LOST's propensity for overloading names) the director of the film is also named Dominic -- Dominic Desjardins.

Although slightly disappointed to miss Dom M, I had the good fortune to speak with a local resident whose home was used to shoot several scenes of the movie. She mentioned that the house had in another life been a branch of the Royal Bank, with the bank on the ground floor and the bank manager living directly above it on the second floor. Here's the fun part -- my Father had also been a bank manager and our family lived directly above the bank that he managed. Crazy, huh?

So, although my quest to meet Dominic Monaghan continues, I did get to visit a location shoot and had a very nice conversation in the process. I've included some pics from the visit below.

For more about the film check out La Sacrée's Facebook Page

The stretch of road on which they were filming was closed off.

A couple of rental trucks and several cast and crew cars lined the road.

The filming location.

The bank manager lived directly above the bank, and even had a concealed peephole in his floor through which he had a direct view of the bank's safe. It's a little hard to see here, but this is a view of the 2nd-storey floor, with the bank safe's door below. (The safe is still in place and the current owner uses it as a pantry.)