Oh, Canada

Veteran filmmaker Paul Schrader refuses to go gentle into that good night. And the same goes for his protagonist here: Leonard Fife (Richard Gere, who starred in Schrader’s American Gigolo many moons ago) is an American-born documentary filmmaker who made his home in Canada. Nearing the end of his life, struggling with late stage cancer, Fife has agreed to film a lengthy autobiographical interview in order to set the record straight, especially about the reasons for his self-imposed exile. His testimony is a confession of lies and betrayal, but for that matter, can his memory be trusted?

Adapted from the late Russell Banks’ last novel, Foregone (2021), Oh Canada isn’t Schrader’s story in its particulars, but it clearly resonated with him on a profound level. Much of the film plays out in flashbacks to the late 1960s and early 70s, with Jacob Elordi playing the young Fife. But the older Fife keeps skipping between different periods, different homes, different women, and while he’s adamant about coming clean, those around him are pressed to make sense of the contradictions in his story.

Schrader — whose career takes in Taxi Driver, Affliction (from another Banks’ novel), and First Reformed — has returned many times to soul-searching protagonists… men in crisis, struggling to make sense of lives that no longer seem adequate to the demands of their time. Oh Canada is a significant addition to that canon.

Paul Schrader pays ruminative and respectful tribute to his late friend, novelist Russell Banks, who gave the writer-director the raw material for one of his best films, Affliction — and now, for one of his best films in years.

Peter Debruge, Variety