Emile

The title character, a retired professor played by Sir Ian McKellen, must come to terms with his past when he returns to Canada for a visit. Emile grew up with two brothers on a farm in Saskatchewan. He left to study in Britain 40 years earlier and never looked back. Until now. Invited to Victoria (British Columbia) to accept an honorary degree from UVic, he stays at the home of his troubled niece, Nadia (Deborah Kara Unger). Recently divorced and living with her rebellious ten year old daughter, Maria (Theo Crane), Nadia still smolders with resentment because Uncle Emile failed to adopt her following the sudden death of her parents. She spent her girlhood in an orphanage and the experience has left a permanent scar on her psyche.

"You seem like a pretty nice guy and I'm going to try to like you. But I don't trust people and you did that to me," she tells him quietly. "Now I'm sure you had your reasons but I just want you to know there was a little girl waiting for you a long time ago. And you left her. Waiting."

That's a haunting image to deal with but Emile also has to confront his feelings of guilt over deserting his two brothers, now deceased, both of whom we meet in flashback scenes: Freddy (Chris William Smith), fragile, artistic, a bit of a dreamer, slowly withering under cruel, insensitive treatment at the hands of older brother, Carl (Tygh Runyan).

Writer/director Carl Bessai (Lola) has McKellen as Emile relive these memories as the old man he is rather than cast an actor to play a younger version of the character in flashback scenes. "I think that's important because the past for him is subjective," Bessai explains on the DVD commentary track. "It is a memory that is infused with who he is right now." Although this may prove confusing for some viewers I thought it was a bold move and well presented visually through artful use of transition shots and doctored cinematography.

The film makes effective use of Victoria locations to add atmosphere, mood and emotional context to key scenes: Emile and Maria chatting on a bench in the Inner Harbour with the Empress Hotel in the background; a blustery walk along Dallas Road; Emile receiving his honorary degree at University of Victoria's Convocation Hall (with 200 extras in attendance.) McKellen turns in a masterful performance, Ms. Unger (Crash) is hypnotically watchable as always and the complex emotional dynamic between their two characters is well worked out. Young Miss Crane, in only her second film, displays a wonderfully natural screen presence. Fans of traditional Hollywood dramas should be warned. As Bessai explains on the DVD, this is not a movie about big dramatic moments, "it's the little things that create the tensions between people, that make them recognizably human." Works for me.

Ian McKellan does a compelling rendition of an aging man come back to revisit and face his past indiscretions. This is augmented by some wonderful performances by some remarkable Canadian actors. Particularly Tygh Runyan and the young Theo Crane. They give refreshingly honest and real performances.

I liked the movie a lot more than I expected. Not that I thought it was going to be a bad movie, but I had no real concept of what I'd think of it so really enjoying it was a nice surprise. We had heard it was slow, but I actually found it to be quite gripping and as such it didn't appear slow at all. At first it was a little distracting watching the movie with Ian McKellen two rows behind us and a couple of seats along, but my focus settled down as we got further in. Not particularly helped by the antarctic blasts of cold coming from the air conditioning right in front of me. I'm lucky I didn't die of hypothermia before the end of the evening. The movie was much more easily identified with than you might expect, being a movie about a 65 year old man and me being anything but. The theme was something I think can get to anyone and what really got me was the story of Emile leaving his two brothers behind and what happened to them subsequently. I think anyone who moves away from their family can understand the need to separate and how easy it can be to let that separation become too vast. As someone who has never lost a close member of my family, and lives in vague terror of the day it finally happens (as it must do unless I'm hit by a bus in the near future), I found the movie very touching and even teared up a couple of times. On a less precise scale, Emile's flaw was that he ran away from responsibility and difficulty and as a result never really lived his life, as far as we can tell. It's always easy to tell ourselves that what we're doing is for the best, but often that can be an excuse for not doing something that seems too hard.

The only flaw I would pick with the movie is that occasionally the music was a little too much. Aside from that the acting was excellent, the script was excellent and the shooting was beautifully done. I think a lot more people will find something to associate with in this movie than might think they would. Have you ever moved away from home? Have you ever not kept in touch when you knew you should? Have you ever been hurt by or betrayed a family member?

This is definitely a character based movie. As such it's never a total waste to watch Ian McKellan work - playing someone trying to come to terms with the difficulties and poor choices in his past, and Deborah Unger truly nails her character - a woman who is bruised and bitter but determined not to give up on life. It's always a treat to see a movie filmed in Canada that doesn't pretend to be somewhere else. Alas the resolution seemed a little too easy and contrived, and I found the soundtrack monotonous and intrusive.

In the second part of a twin bill for Ian McKellen, he stars with Deborah Kara Unger in a compelling drama about a man who goes back home after 40 years and has to deal with the past he left behind.

In contrast to Cold Comfort Farm, in which McKellan played a small role, this movie is all about him. He goes back and forth from the present to his life in Canada 40 years before. He even engages in conversations with his brothers, who appear in the present. he works to resolve his crisis and, with the help of 10-year-old Theo Crane, is able to come to a comfortable conclusion.

For those of us who leave home and return, there is a lot of things familiar in this very good movie.