Tristan Wheeler has a simple question: How do you make films in a city where the cost of rent might kill you first?
“We live in a city where living is very expensive. So, you spend most of your time trying to cover basic needs: getting a job, having a roof over your head. That requires more time away from being a creative person,” the director says of Toronto, the setting and inspiration for his crazy, dark comedy. toronto apartmentFor a tenant who sublets his place on an hourly basis in order to make rent.
Wheeler spoke to THR After the film premiered at the Mammoth Lakes Film Festival in California in May and before its Canadian premiere Wednesday night at Toronto’s Paradise Theater as part of the Bleeding Edge screening. The city’s chronic housing crisis — mirroring that of other expensive creative centers like New York, Los Angeles, and London — provided the film’s absurd premise, but its real-world impact on Wheeler’s community is no joke.
For him, it’s a class issue. “I’m from a working-class family. I don’t have a huge credit or anything like that. So I have to make home art on a very low budget and I have to use those limitations to my advantage and lean into them,” he explains, noting the growing gap between Toronto filmmakers who can afford to sustain their creative careers and those who can’t.
toronto apartment It begins with Lock O’Hara (played by Wheeler) being dumped by his girlfriend Ava (Jessica Grossman), who has moved out and left him unable to cover the rent on his own. Facing eviction, Luke hatches a scheme: sublease the apartment by the hour he’s not using it. It’s not long before he’s doing brisk business with a group of nomadic tenants in Toronto—a platonic, asexual dating group, a feminist book club, and a “knitting group” that turns out to be a secret terrorist cell—all of whom are paying to use his “community space.” The landlord (Neil Armstrong) is less charming.
A budding romance complicates matters. Multimedia artist Thalia (Alex Jodi Ferg) wants to install a green screen in the apartment; Luke resists the novelty but finds himself drawn to it. The film’s central dilemma gradually comes into focus: is Luke a charitable provider to the community, or just another landlord profiting from Toronto’s high rents?
toronto apartment It is set in 2024 as the city’s real-life real estate market bubble begins to burst. This came as Wheeler moved from sublease to sublease to stay afloat after moving to eastern Canada from the West Coast.
“I ended my relationship and had to move out and needed a place to stay,” he recalls. “So I was jumping from weird sublease to weird sublease, just trying to live as a creative person, trying to live, for a while, in this city. And I was thinking every day I woke up and having to struggle to figure it out.”
This struggle included toronto apartment Directed by Wheeler on a budget of $10,000, using a $200 camera in collaboration with local filmmakers over 11 days of shooting on weekends. Its staff included Braden Setter Sr. as cinematographer and executive producer and Austin Burch as associate producer.
The lo-fi aesthetic is completely intentional. “When you watch this movie, it seems very low budget, and that’s intentional,” Wheeler explains. “I can’t make my movie feel like it was written by Christopher Nolan or Ari Aster or anything like that. I have to know it’s a piece of art made by someone trying to make it work.”
It also bypassed the Canadian government funding that many local filmmakers rely on, bringing its own freedoms. “The two things together, you can’t ruin the day of the movie because we don’t have the money to reshoot, but also just $10,000. I don’t have to give someone a million dollars at the end of this. I don’t have investors in that intense way. So we can have more fun and experimentation and find excitement in the moments.”
“This is both a blessing and a curse,” Wheeler insists, “because it allows you to create art, to create an expression of yourself that is so tight and pure, that you have to fight to get to the surface—for all these resources that make that process a little bit easier.” He also had creative freedom when making it toronto apartment.
“Both things together,” Wheeler recalls, “You can’t screw up the day of the movie because we don’t have the money to reshoot. But also just $10,000. I don’t have to give somebody a million dollars at the end of this. I don’t have investors in that intense way. So we can have more fun and be experimental and find excitement in the moments.” With Toronto in its title, the black comedy continues a recent trend in Canadian film where directors use the cities they live in as characters, no longer hiding the locations as they would anywhere in the USA.
These include Sophie Rumvari’s first feature, blue heron, Which was filmed in and around Vancouver, in the Toronto area Nirvana the band, the show, the movie Written by Matt Johnson, Jay McCarroll, and Chandler Levack mile End Kicks, A romantic comedy starring Barbie Ferreira set in a trendy Montreal neighbourhood. “These movies are so big now in Canada… They’re not trying to be like New York City. And my movie is about a guy who lives in Toronto, because I’m a guy who lives in Toronto,” Wheeler insists.
Ultimately, he made the film for young artists who feel the same pressure as him — and face new threats from artificial intelligence on top of old ones like rent.
“My film is for people like me,” Wheeler says. “I came to this city because I wanted to be a creative person, and I knew there were a lot of fun and interesting things that happened here. I also didn’t have a lot of money. But I was able to figure that out and I hope people who see this film will say, ‘Okay, I can do that.'” As long as you understand your film and your budget, you can create something that people will connect with.
