I saw a terrible Canadian movie last night, La Vie avec Mon Père, about this old writer who lives in a big messy house in very boring Westmount, and his two sons who come to stay with him, one son is a wannabe writer and layabout, the other is head of some pharmaceutical company. The dad is old chiefly. That's his role. He used to be a ladies' man and still pursues female doctors or has visions of the subway full of naked women, but that's all the character provided.

See? Sex, old age, death—brilliant, no? Let me out of here.

Anyway, each of the characters has the exact problems that you would expect would be assigned to those stereotypical characters! Writer-wannabe: taking drugs, smoking, typing, whacky, has understanding girlfriend; business-head son: stiff, strict, has cold lawyer wife; his heart melts though when confronted with dad's aging and disintegration.

But what really caught my attention was the sheer truckloads of money spent on this. Everything was all lush: candlelit scenes, every intake of breath is heard, overhead shots of skaters, lots of “interesting” music. The old man has three big dogs, a mastiff, a baskerville and an afghan, and there are some scenes where they are in the kitchen with the people, so you can hear them (for some reason) slobbering on bones and puffing away. I think they must have spent a lot of money on the old dad's house, temporarily turning a large, well-appointed place in Westmount into a shabby, rambling, cluttered old writer's house. They would have had to hire experts in that sort of thing, people who really have cool ideas about old writers and know where to get the necessary props. They did all that for this dumb story.

Then at the end, the two sons ... discover ... that they are ... something.

Labels: Cinema