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Cole

Monday March 22 at 1:30, 4:15 and 7 pm in Owen Sound
Wednesday March 24 at 6:45 pm in Port Elgin

Cole Chambers (Richard de Klerk in a star-making performance) is an aspiring writer living in Lytton, British Columbia. While the community of 350 may lack the speed of the big city, it nonetheless provides intriguing source material for the stories that fill Cole’s notebook. Hoping to gain experience, he enrolls in a writing course in the city, a three-hour drive each way. In class he meets Serafina (Kandyse McClure), a black woman who lives with her wealthy and controlling parents. Cole and Serafina start an affair few close to them understand.

However, Cole’s responsibilities at home – including helping to run the family business and protecting his nephew from his sister’s abusive boyfriend – begin to overwhelm him. Cole feels his chances of evading a certain future for one of unknown promise are beginning to fade, and he must take drastic steps to change direction.

Cole, which screened at the 2009 Toronto International Film Festival® and toured the festival circuit in the weeks that followed, is an intense and insightful drama from director Carl Bessai (Normal, Mothers &Daughters) and writer Adam Zang. Bessai turns his lens from his typical urban setting to more rural surroundings, and finds both beauty and pathos. Using the town of Lytton as a character itself, Bessai paints an authentic and honest portrait of small-town Canadian life. He also coaxes stirring performances from his cast: de Klerk and McClure anchor the film with their casual intimacy, while Forrester makes a strong debut as the young Rocket.

But most searing is the go-for-broke performance by Willett, whose riveting and at times terrifying Bobby embodies the film’s tension between hope and despair. Cole is Bessai’s most assured movie yet. Expanding on familiar themes – identity, for example – he uses the film’s out-of-town setting to explore how place and race influence our sense of self. In the divides between urban and rural and between privilege and disadvantage, Bessai and Zang unearth optimism, both in love’s ability to transcend social obstacles and in the transformative potential of creativity. At times challenging but ultimately life-affirming, Cole is a polished and mature work from one of Canada’s most active and engaging filmmakers.  95 minutes  Not yet rated.

Director: Carl Bessai

Cast: Richard de Klerk, Kandyse

McClure, Sonja Bennett, Chad

Willett, Jack Forrester, Chad

Willet, Michael Eisner, Rebecca

Jenkins