There's a hush of excitement as the cast and crew of a new film on teen bullying, pariahs , assemble in front of a movie screen at Archbishop MacDonald Catholic high school.

The lights dim, the opening credits roll and the students stand back and watch as the result of more than two years of writing, acting, shooting and editing rolls across the screen.

This excitement will build until August, when the crew plans to enter the 75-minute movie in the feature-film category at Toronto's International Teen Movie Festival.

Many students and staff at the west Edmonton high school will see the movie for the first time at its school-only premiere tonight.

But for the three teens at the centre of the production, this is about the 300th time they've watched it.

Lighting director Tim Bouwsema, 18, grins when asked how much work he's put into pariahs since the work started.

"We could recite the whole movie for you right now, every line," he says of himself, actor Russell Bell and director Will Beauchamp.

Beauchamp remembers the day he and Bell got the idea for pariahs. It was April 20, 1999, the day of the school shooting at Columbine high school in Colorado, when two students, described as outcasts, killed 12 of their classmates and one of their teachers before taking their own lives.

"We were sitting in science class, and our student teacher came in and told us what was happening. I remember being physically sick about it," Beauchamp says. "Russell and I looked at each other, and we didn't say it, but we both knew we wanted to do something."

Beauchamp says he knew immediately that film was the medium he wanted to use to deliver his anti-bullying message to his peers. "Film is our generation's way of communication," he said. "I don't read a lot of books, but I watch a lot of movies."

In its first incarnation, the film was simply a re-telling of the Columbine shooting, but Beauchamp and his team weren't happy with that.

"We didn't want to mirror Columbine because that's exactly what (the two gunmen) wanted: fame and notoriety," says Bell. "So we took the issue of bullying and teasing and made a more general story about it."

Beauchamp, Bell and Bouwsema all say they were driven to finish the film because of the bullying they see among teens every day. "You see it. You see kids getting picked on every day in the hallway, and it just builds and builds.

"This film sort of shows some alternatives you can turn to, instead of violence, if you're being bullied."

Their teacher, Harvey Diduch, guesses it cost about $1,000, not including equipment.

And Beauchamp can't resist pumping the film up a little.

"It starts off like a campy teen movie, but it gets deeper. It really hits you hard," he said.

The premiere of pariahs coincides with the launch of a national campaign against bullying by Justice Minister Martin Cauchon on Thursday.

The campaign will feature television commercials beginning in June.

The ad campaign comes in the wake of several teen deaths in which bullying was a factor.

In 1997 British Columbia teen Reena Virk died after beatings at the hands of other teens.

In March, two B.C. teens were convicted in the death of Dawn-Marie Wesley, 14, who hanged herself in November 2000 after writing a note in which she described their bullying.

                       - Edmonton Journal, 2002.