In 2021, I took part in filming what would eventually become Untrodden 2: The Treasure of the Algonquin People, an independent Metal Source Studios production born in the Ottawa area. The resources were extremely modest, but the people making it had a genuine desire to make a movie.
From web series to feature film
An earlier incarnation of Untrodden had been produced as a web series in 2018. What we were shooting in 2021 was originally meant to become a second season under the title Untrodden Season 2: The Treasure of the Algonquin People.
Then the project grew along the way.
The lines between web series, second season and film became increasingly blurry as more material accumulated, until this second chapter was ultimately assembled as a feature-length film. The project is now listed as Untrodden 2: The Treasure of the Algonquin People, released in 2024.
Eugene enters the story
I played Eugene, a supporting character who crosses paths with the protagonist played by Serguei Konioukhov.
My scenes were filmed over two days a little more than two months apart, with Serguei and Adil Belhadji. And when I say it was a small crew, that description is almost generous: for much of my material, there were essentially three of us doing everything.
Adil directed and wrote the project while handling a significant part of the cinematography. Serguei produced, co-shot the film and took care of much of the technical work and visual effects. Both of them also appeared on camera.
On location, however, titles became secondary very quickly. Actor, director, camera, sound, boom, makeup, lighting, props, logistics — roles changed constantly according to what the next shot required. Someone who had been in front of the camera a few minutes earlier could suddenly be holding the boom, moving gear or helping prepare the next setup. It was filmmaking in its most handmade form.
June 20, 2021 — Southern Farm and Pinhey Forest, Nepean
My first day of filming took place on June 20, 2021, around Southern Farm and Pinhey Forest in Nepean, Ontario.
Eugene appeared as a kind of lone warrior pursuing Serguei’s main character. Much of the day therefore involved prowling, tracking and chase scenes through the woods.
The location did a great deal of the work for us: narrow paths, dense vegetation, trees and uneven terrain. Rather than trying to recreate an environment with resources we did not have, we used the forest itself — including its inconveniences — to give the scenes texture.
Run, chase… and do it again
And we had to move. A lot. Run through the woods, disappear behind trees, reappear somewhere else, chase, be chased, reposition the camera, repeat the movement from another angle…
The day included a particularly physical hand-to-hand fight between our characters. A sequence like that becomes demanding quickly with such a tiny crew. You have to think about movement, camera angles, continuity and the rhythm of the fight while keeping enough energy to repeat the takes. There was obviously no stunt team, multiple-camera setup and twenty technicians around us. We had to build the scene with what we had, figure out how to shoot it… and then go for it.
August 29, 2021 — Hull
I came back to film a little more than two months later, on August 29, 2021. The day began in Hull, Gatineau, around Place du Portage. The contrast with the previous shoot was striking. After the woods of Nepean, we were suddenly working in a very urban environment surrounded by concrete and government buildings. Once again, the location itself became our production design.
But that was only the beginning of the day. After Hull, we headed somewhere very different.
Next stop: Lusk Cave
We drove to Lusk Cave in Gatineau Park to film a long series of tracking and chase scenes. That is where the day became much more physical. Part of the sequence took place in the forest around the cave, with a long pursuit between the characters, before the chase continued into the rocky passages themselves.
We had to move through a wet, dark and uneven environment while continuing to think both as actors and as a film crew. Get the equipment inside. Find a place for the camera. Work with the available light. Repeat a movement. Find another angle.
And, incidentally, try not to wipe out on the rocks.
When the chase turns supernatural
The natural atmosphere of the location did a huge part of the work. The deeper the characters moved into the caves, the more easily the film could shift toward something strange and unsettling.
The pursuit eventually took on an almost supernatural dimension with the appearance of a ghostly Wendigo inside the cave. Not exactly the sort of shooting day where you spend your breaks sitting in a trailer. There was no trailer.
Three people, every department
What stays with me most about the production today is probably the way it was made. It would be easy to describe Untrodden simply as an amateur production. Technically, it was. But the word does not really describe what was happening on the ground.
Adil and Serguei were not starting from nothing. Untrodden had already existed as a web series, and Metal Source Studios had already developed a world with its own characters, visual style and effects. The second chapter was simply much more ambitious: more characters, more locations, more action, scenes in forests, cities and caves, fights, chases and fantasy elements — all with a production structure that remained tiny.
During my scenes there was almost no comfortable separation between departments. We were the departments. Someone needed to hold the boom? One of us grabbed it. Costume or makeup needed an adjustment? We handled it. Move equipment, prepare a shot, find an angle, check sound, light what we could, play the scene and carry everything a few hundred metres farther? Same crew. And because Serguei and Adil were both in front of and behind the camera, we regularly had to invent solutions simply to get everyone into the shot.
An ambition much larger than the resources
Looking back, that is exactly what gives the experience such a particular place in my memories of filming. It was not a large production machine. It was a few passionate people in a forest, downtown Hull or deep inside a cave, with a camera, gear we had to carry ourselves and a story much more ambitious than the resources available to us. What had started as a second season of a web series kept evolving, survived a long production and postproduction period, and eventually found its form as a feature film in 2024.
Somewhere in those roughly three hours of film is Eugene, chasing a man through the woods before becoming tangled up in caves and a Wendigo. When I think back on it, the whole thing was completely handmade. But it was also real filmmaking.
