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<\/a>40 Days at Base Camp<\/em> had its world premiere at the Vancouver International Film Festival (VIFF) this past October; all three screenings sold out.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019ve seen a lot of Mount Everest and climbing documentaries; what\u2019s really outstanding about this one is that you got to see the climbers\u2019 personalities,\u201d says VIFF\u2019s Canadian images programmer Terry McEvoy. \u201cUsually a documentary is about the glory of getting to the top of the mountain, but this one\u2019s about an outlaw community; you\u2019re dying a little bit every day that you\u2019re there.\u201d<\/p>\n 40 Days at Base Camp<\/em> was also the opening film for the Banff Mountain Film Festival. In April it will screen at the Trento Film Festival in Italy, the world\u2019s oldest mountain film festival.<\/p>\n \u201cThis is an independent film, so I want to get it out to the world,\u201d says Whelan. \u201cGetting out in Canada is the first step in that long process.\u201d<\/p>\n During her cross-Canada tour, Whelan hopes to create awareness that Canadian-content films are both rare and unregulated.<\/p>\n \u201cWe want to bring attention to these two points,\u201d she says. \u201cOne, [Canadian] English films have represented only one percent of the domestic box office in Canada for decades; two, unlike in radio and television, which both have strict Canadian content regulations, there is no protection for Canadian content in movie theatres. With all the mergers in media, essentially a handful of people decide what we see on TV and in the theatres.\u201d<\/p>\n