John Gurdebeke

Movies

The Girl Who Escaped: The Kara Robinson Story
Editor
The TRUE STORY of how Kara Robinson was kidnapped, assaulted and held captive for 18 hours, 15-year-old Kara Robinson plots a daring escape from a serial killer's apartment.
Romance In Style
Editor
Ella's unique designs inspire publishing mogul Derek to include plussized fashion in his magazine. It's not long before Derek realizes that Ella's influence reaches far beyond the catwalk.
A House on Fire
Editor
A House on Fire follows brilliant doctor and mother Deborah Green (Stephanie March) who had the epitome of a picture-perfect life with two children, an adoring husband (Shaun Benson) and a beautiful house in an opulent neighborhood. But behind the curtain is a rocky marriage that includes Deb’s difficult bedside manner, her inability to get along with other doctors and an abuse of pills and alcohol, major envy of her husband’s successful medical career and his easy social manner, that takes a terrible turn and leaves her family and marriage in ruin.
A Winter Getaway
Editor
When an average guy is gifted a luxury trip, he is mistaken as a millionaire. But then, sparks fly with the lovely concierge. Will she feel the same way about him when she learns the truth?
Hunter Hunter
Editor
A fur trapper leaves his wife and daughter behind to kill a rogue wolf in the remote wilderness, but they soon become increasingly worried when their peaceful existence is disrupted.
Red Letter Day
Supervising Editor
While adjusting to a new life in the suburban community of Aspen Ridge, a recently divorced mother of two receives mysterious letters instructing her and her teenage children to kill the people in their letters before they kill them. Paranoia and chaos ensues as the family attempts to rationally deal with an irrational situation.
Escaping the Madhouse: The Nellie Bly Story
Editor
An investigative reporter Nellie Bly, who’s on a mission to expose the deplorable conditions and mistreatment of patients at the notorious Women’s Lunatic Asylum, and feigns mental illness in order to be institutionalized to report from the inside. The movie is an account of actual events surrounding Nellie’s stay beginning after she has undergone treatment, leaving her with no recollection of how she came to the asylum or her real identity.
The Green Fog
Sound Post Supervisor
A tribute to a fascinating film shot by Alfred Hitchcock in 1958, starring James Stewart and Kim Novak, and to the city of San Francisco, California, where the magic was created; but also a challenge: how to pay homage to a masterpiece without using its footage; how to do it simply by gathering images from various sources, all of them haunted by the curse of a mysterious green fog that seems to cause irrepressible vertigo…
Losing Our Religion
Editor
Brendan is a pastor in a small, evangelical church, and he has a secret. He doesn't believe in God anymore. His wife is still a true believer - and she just told the wrong person. Losing Our Religion is a feature length documentary about preachers who are not believers, and what atheists do when they miss church. Allowed access to the 600 members of The Clergy Project - a safe haven for preachers from all faiths who no longer believe - the documentary follows ex-members and clergy who are still undercover. They are not just losing their religion, for many they are losing their friends, community and even family. As well as their job. As events unfold that change lives forever, their stories also connect with secular communities that are growing in surprising places. New groups are experimenting in ways to have church without god, and asking the same question as unbelieving clergy - "what's next?"
The Forbidden Room
Editor
A submarine crew, a feared pack of forest bandits, a famous surgeon, and a battalion of child soldiers all get more than they bargained for as they wend their way toward progressive ideas on life and love.
Bring Me the Head of Tim Horton
Cinematography
Guided by the spirit of “The Cuadecuc Manifesto” (coined by co-director Evan Johnson and inspired by Pere Portabella’s 1970 experimental cult documentary, Cuadecuc, vampir), Bring Me the Head of Tim Horton is a strange, stirring behind-the-scenes look at Paul Gross’s new feature, Hyena Road. Shot on location at CFB Shilo near Brandon, Manitoba, and in Aqaba, Jordan, the film mixes deep contrast black-and-white expressionism with wry and raw western revisionism reminiscent of Sam Peckinpah, as it summons unwieldy, psychedelic energy from the main event. [TIFF]
Borealis
Editor
Jonah, an unemployed gambler, takes his estranged pot-smoking teen-aged daughter Aurora on a dangerous road trip to Churchill, Manitoba to show her the magnificent Northern Lights - before her vision disorder renders her completely blind.
Sinclair
Editor
A four minute film created for the opening of the TIFF Bell Lightbox
Send Me to the 'Lectric Chair
Editor
A woman sent is sent to an electric chair that reads the images of her mind.
Glorious
Editor
A story about an aging crime family patriarch.
Footsteps
Editor
Short documentary revealing how the sound effects were created for Maddin's film "Brand Upon the Brain".
It's My Mother's Birthday Today
Editor
Guy Maddin directed this short biopic on the castrato known as the Manitoba Meadowlark, Dov Houle, who performed on tour with the film “Brand Upon the Brain!”
97 Percent True
Documentary featuring interviews with director Guy Madden and his collaborators
My Winnipeg
Editor
The geographical dead center of North America and the beloved birthplace of Guy Maddin, Winnipeg, is the frosty and mysterious star of Maddin’s film. Fact, fantasy and memory are woven seamlessly together in this work, conjuring a city as delightful as it is fearsome.
Brand Upon the Brain!
Editor
Guy and his sister grow up on an island. His domineering mother keeps watch over everything from the tip of a lighthouse, his eccentric father experiments in the basement laboratory. Then there are the orphans, on whose heads the adoptive parents later find puzzling wounds. Another brother and sister pair is sent to the island: the Lightball Kids, two detectives that are meant to bring light into the darkness. The brothers and sisters are all yanked into the emotional roller coaster of first love, while something cryptic comes to light in the parents' house.
Odin's Shield Maiden
Editor
My Dad Is 100 Years Old
Editor
A tribute to Isabella Rossellini's father
Nude Caboose
Editor
A jovial shirtless man attempts to rouse a contingent of lethargic dancers to life in NUDE CABOOSE. His highjinks really get the deadbeats bustin' out until something unusual catches his eye. Dance floor seduction distilled into a fateful moment!
Audition One
Editor
Ignorant armies of sketchy people clashing by night.
Audition Two
Editor
Ignorant armies of sketchy people clashing by night continued.
FuseBoy
Editor
The electric metre is broken, lets play with the fuses...
Sissy-Boy Slap-Party
Editor
Sailors in repose on an island paradise seemingly have no worries of war or danger — until a playful gesture is interpreted as an act of wilful aggression. Soon, the innocent act of slight slapping becomes a relentless and unforgiving orgy of open-palmed face-smacking.
Rooster Workbook
Editor
A sexually-charged short film which includes images of roosters and women.
Zookeeper Workbook
Editor
A surreal short film featuring a zookeeper with a large moustache.