One of Canada’s most prolific and accomplished filmmakers, Patricia Rozema (I've Heard the Mermaids Singing; Mansfield Park) has turned her gifted eye toward adapting a stage play for the screen, and the result is one of the most inventive and emotionally compelling films of the year. After her mother’s sudden death, 30-year-old writer Cassandra (played by both Amy Nostbakken and Norah Sadava) tasks herself with writing the eulogy, despite the misgivings of her family. While assisting with the other arrangements, Cassandra revisits key incidents in her often contentious relationship with her mother, a woman who gave up her own budding literary career to raise children in suburbia. Nuanced performances capture the common duality of female identity, and Rozema’s interplay between past and present, underscored with gentle humor, brings comfort to Cass when she accepts the multifaceted power of maternal love.

Director Patricia Rozema and Screenwriter/Actress Norah Sadava