Your humble narrator likes to be reasonably upfront in the pursuit of Canadian film. Seagrass reminds me of a childhood situation where the children went to a camp while the parents pursued the goals of the conference.
In Seagrass, the parents Judith (American actor Ally Maki) and Steve (English actor Luke Roberts) are going though a relationship workshop on Gabriola Island in British Columbia in the mid-1990s. They take the BC Ferries to this place. They have 2 daughters Stephanie (Nyha Huang Breitkreuz) and Emmy (Remy Marthaller) who have their own adventure.
We spend more time with the kids to start. Stephanie is older and concerned with peer pressure from girls her age about boys and more. Emmy has a hard time making friends and worries that her dead grandma is now a ghost. Judith is still mourning her dead mother (the children's grandmother). Judith and Steve deal more with their children than each other.
The adults meet a couple who have been to this workshop previously. Pat (Australian actor Chris Pang) and Carol (Sarah Gadon) seem much happier to Judith and Steve in great part because they don't have children. Judith and Pat are of Japanese descent and find themselves bonding on some level, being the Japanese part of a mixed marriage. Pat asks Judith about where her parents were interred during World War II (yes, Canada did this, too). Judith, to her dismay, doesn't know and can't ask her mother.
Pat and Carol break through barriers while Judith and Steve struggle within the workshop. Judith says Steve can't share his feelings but you get the impression that if Steve could share, Judith might not be listening.
We are drawn to films that feel real. Meredith Hama-Brown brings that reality as writer/director in her feature film debut. There is a reason why Seagrass won the FIPRESCI Prize at the 2023 Toronto International Film Festival where the film made its debut.
The silence is very intentional. The dimly lit scenes fit the island and the family dynamic. The dinner table is not a happy place. We see Stephanie want to leave the table as soon as she can.
The intimacy scene where Steve starts and how quickly that ends tells us a lot of what they don't say.
While Judith and Pat bond over their shared ancestry, we don't see Steve and Carol together by themselves in any scene.
We are told the time is mid 1990s yet one scene conveys the concern over the recent riots in Vancouver after the Stanley Cup final loss to the New York Rangers. That puts things squarely in the summer of 1994. This feels like a conscious choice by Hama-Brown.
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Seagrass is one of the best debut films we've seen from any director, Canadian or otherwise. You could get sad toward the end knowing you will stop getting to know these characters. The characters aren't great people but they are intriguing.
We mentioned the FIPRESCI Prize at TIFF 23. The film was named to TIFF's annual Canada's Top Ten list for 2023.
The film had some brief runs in U.S. cities such as New York City, Los Angeles, Las Vegas, and Philadelphia, among others. Seagrass is available on Crave in Canada and on demand in the United States.
video credit: Game Theory Films
photo credit: Seagrass
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