ORH, CANADA – THE BETRAYALS
Type: existential-philosophical drama
Direction: by Paul Schrader. With Richard Gere, Uma Thurman, Jacob Elordi, Victoria Hill, Michael Imperioli, Caroline Havernas, Penelope Mitchell
Feeling close to the end of your life, Leonard Fife – symbol of resistance against the war in Vietnam in the 1970s (to avoid the draft he fled to Canada) and then became an acclaimed documentary director with a strong progressive commitment – he agreed to tell his story in front of the camera of one of his (adoring) former students.
But that interview becomes the way to come to terms with his past and confess – also to his wife (Uma Thurman), who attends the filming – the many “lies” on which he had built his existence.
Richard Gere in “Oh, Canada”
The starting point is The betrayals by Russell Banks, but in the hands of Schrader – who signed the screenplay in long discussions with his writer friend and who throughout his career “invented stories” that questioned the surrounding world – the film becomes a reflection on the relationship between reality and fiction.
To do it mixes up the plans, uses a young Leonard Fife who he sometimes replaces in an anti-realistic way with the adult one (played by Richard Gere). Citing Sigmund Freud and Susan Sontag he also questions his own career.
For those who want to reflect on the use of images together with Richard Gere.
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