Very likely, when Booker prize-winning author Kazuo Ishiguro wrote his original screenplay The Saddest Music in the World over a decade ago, even this gifted writer couldn't have guessed where his story would end up.

Fast forward to February, 2003, as director Guy Maddin and his dedicated crew begin shooting in Winnipeg's largest building: the Dominion Bridge factory. This represents something of a prodigal return for Maddin, as it was the same place he filmed his celebrated short The Heart of the World in 2000. The Saddest Music script has evolved into a piece that will be happily familiar territory for established Maddin fans: under the pen of George Toles, Ishiguro's story has been transplanted from real-life London in the 90s to a snowbound fantasyland Winnipeg in the depths of the Great Depression. Many of Guy's principle concerns will be addressed: love, amnesia, profound emotions expressed in broad, torturous gestures, hockey, paternal betrayal, beer in stubby bottles, and the town of Winnipeg itself, the very capital of sadness.

Production Designer Matthew Davies has built Winnipeg inside this cavernous bridge works. Sagging buildings of purposely claptrap construction are corralled by ice-laden phone lines, and get physically smaller towards the back of Dominion Bridge to give the impression of a larger city receding off into the distance. The crew have brought in dump trucks full of snow – the cheapest set dressing there is, Davies acknowledges – and sprinkled it with glitter to give a magical effect. Yes, magical! For if there were no magic on screen, it would be difficult to call this a Guy Maddin film.

Another cheap form of set dressing used in plenty on The Saddest Music in the World is extras. All types of people in outlandish costumes from across the globe are required to play the depressed hordes who flock to Winnipeg to compete for Lady Port-Huntley's thousands. But extras are one thing; extras with musical talent quite another! These are recruited by means of an extensive audition process held months before in a Winnipeg hotel, and the flood of multinational talent who answered the call astonished Maddin and his producers alike. The wonderful Paz family, lately of El Salvador and Mexico, and the comfortably shod Heather Belles, a troupe of distaff bagpipers, are but two examples of the musical gold culled from this audition.

The first week of shooting proves a staggering ordeal, as Maddin has cast Portugese actress Maria de Medeiros in a major role. Why so difficult? Well, de Medeiros has taken the part of Narcissa despite being in the middle of rehearsals for a play she is mounting in her home town of Porto. This allows her six days, and not a minute more, to film a part which demands at least ten or twelve days to cover satisfactorily. Maddin is nothing if not game for a challenge, however, and he sets about covering the action with two, four, six or even eight cameras rolling away at once. The state of affairs is further enervated by Maria's extreme fear of the cold; and the Dominion Bridge building is, to put it simply, freezing! The building is large enough to house its own climate, and it is not uncommon to witness clouds gathering force about thirty or forty feet up and a mini-blizzard suddenly filling the air. This was no treat for poor Maria, and the tiny storms seemed, with a bully's unerring sense for quarry, to single her out for victimization and chilly snow-showers. She survived the week like a trooper, but it must be admitted that nerves were more than a bit frayed in the minutes leading up to her plane ride home, as literally dozens of crucial shots had to be taken in a filmmaking frenzy to fit everything in.

Maddin rightly guessed that almost anything would seem easier after a trial like this. Shooting continued in the giant Frigidaire that is the Dominion Bridge building (which, legend has it, carries the subzero temperatures of winter in its cavernous belly until at least mid-June). The other principal actors, Isabella Rossellini, Mark McKinney, David Fox and Ross McMillan, were all subjected to trials beyond the scope of their previous acting experience. The cinematic tricks used to transform Rossellini into a double amputee were from an era when an actor's comfort was far from the top priority, but the legendary actor/model jumped in with – you'll pardon me here – both feet. Her enthusiasm for taking on the legless role of Lady Port-Huntly seemed to know no bounds!

It was with a great parcel of memory that cast and crew ended their days at the Dominion Bridge building. There could be only one capper to the experience: a great group sing-song. And this was enacted, finally, with no cameras running – nothing to capture the moment but the group memory bank of several dozen exhausted and shivering artisans of film!