March 14, 2010: One Week
I felt a bit guilty not seeing One Week in the theatre. I knew roughly what it was about, and the reviews were decent and it starred Joshua Jackson who is a fairly popular star (even in the US – largely due to his role in Dawson’s Creek a decade ago, as well as some of the teen-interest films which came out around that time). But I knew it was Canadian, and Canadian films do have a tendency to have a certain look, a certain level of production value, and a certain inferiority complex.
One Week doesn’t seem to be plagued by as many of these “Canadian film” weaknesses as some are, and while I certainly didn’t see a masterpiece, the story and scenery and production were entirely competitive with smaller independent US product. In fact, it’s a strong positive that One Week is unabashedly Canadian, reveling in the cross-country journey and familiar landmarks which are completely unknown to the vast majority of Americans, not to mention the rest of the world.
Set in Toronto, we start out as Jackson learns that he has an illness which will leave him with an unknown number of months to live. Understandably, he freaks out but in a quiet way, pulling back from his fiancée and family and trying to figure out what to do. Some people turn to others at these times of crisis, and others turn inward. Jackson turns inward, deciding to buy a classic motorcycle and head out of town for a few days. He drives west, seeing his country the way everyone knows they should see their own native land, and having a series of experiences which are frankly a bit too convenient and timely but are entirely to be expected in a movie. Meanwhile, his fiancée begs him to come home and doesn’t understand why he has shut everyone else out of this journey of self-discovery, which he feels he must allow himself before submitting to cancer treatments which will have unknown devastating effects on him.
It’s always neat for me to see recognizable Toronto neighbourhoods in the movies, and this one being actually set in Toronto, they don’t make the usual efforts to hide streetcars and certain stores. I can’t say I’m a big fan of the cheesy Tim Horton’s coffee cup fortune being Jackson’s inspiration to ride west, although I must admit it’s as quintessentially Canadian as you can get. A number of the tourist landmarks he visits are familiar to me from a trip I took out west with my family a couple of years ago.
I noted that some of our protagonist’s experiences on the road didn’t seem believable. Do you really find a nice-looking girl in the woods with a guitar who you happen to make love to later that night under the stars? When you find a dead dog in the ditch in the middle of the prairies, does it typically belong to a philosophically-minded middle-aged woman who can give you some advice about the meaning of life? Do you encounter a mellow guy (played by Tragically Hip front man Gord Downie) sitting outside his motel room one evening who can inspire you to think about the valuable things in life? But thinking about it, I realized that Jackson’s character is a warm and friendly guy (I get the sense that the illness allowed him to step out of a self-imposed shell which had led to him becoming engaged to a prim and proper actuary). He’s absolutely the kind of person who would talk with the people around him, and delve beneath the surface in a hurry. A key point here is that he doesn’t mention his medical situation to anyone – he bonds with them on unbiased terms. He’s finally able to allow himself to live, just after he’s found out he’s going to die.
Of course, such a story is standard Hollywood tear-jerker fare. It’s nice to know that we here in Canada can “rise” to that level when the mood strikes, isn’t it? But, the movie is lively and fun, and it doesn’t take the easy way out with the relationship resolution, which pushes it up a couple of notches to a recommendation from me.
One Week shows us one country.
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