Genre
Synopsis
At age 19, Ashley Smith has spent the last three years alone in a cell, locked up for throwing apples at a postman. Her 30-day sentence has morphed into nearly four years for “bad behaviour”. Unable to stop Ashley from tying ligatures around her neck, guards are ordered not to enter her cell unless she stops breathing. Blending truth and magic realism, 1047 DAYS tells the story of Ashley’s last days inside Kitchener’s Grand Valley Institution and imagines an alternate ending to the brutal reality that led to her death. A true story based on the last days of Ashley Smith’s life inside a maximum security prison in Kitchener, Ontario.
Bio
Nadine Pequeneza is an award-winning producer-director-writer based in Toronto, Canada. Her documentary films have garnered nine Canadian Screen Awards and Gemini nominations, including a CSA for Best Writing in a Documentary for her debut feature 15 TO LIFE: KENNETH’S STORY (2014). Her latest feature film release LAST OF THE RIGHT WHALES (2021) won Best Canadian Feature at the Planet in Focus International Film Festival and was #1 at the Canadian box office on opening weekend.
Nadine recently completed her first dramatic short (proof of concept) and feature narrative script based on a true story, 1047 DAYS. The short was selected for the CFC/Netflix Calling Card Accelerator and the feature script was a finalist for the 2023 Humanitas New Voices Fellowship and the 2021 Whistler Screenwriters Lab. In 2023 she completed her second screenplay RARE EARTH working with writing coach Pilar Alessandra.
Nadine is an alumnus of The Redford Center grantee program for environmental storytelling and The Fledgling Fund’s Engagement Lab for audience outreach and film distribution. Her company HitPlay Productions has two documentary features in production: AN UNFINISHED JOURNEY and SEEING GREEN.
Awards History
Page International Awards 2024 - Quarterfinalist
Humanitas New Voices Fellowship 2023 - Semifinalist
Canadian Film Centre/Netflix 2022 - Calling Card Accelerator
