Termini Station (film)

Termini Station is a 1989 Canadian drama film directed by Allan King and written by Colleen Murphy.[1]

Termini Station
Directed byAllan King
Produced byAllan King
Written byColleen Murphy
StarringMegan Follows
Colleen Dewhurst
Gordon Clapp
Debra McGrath
Music byMychael Danna
CinematographyBrian R.R. Hebb
Edited byGordon McClellan
Production
company
Saturday Plays Ltd.
Distributed byNorthern Arts Entertainment
Release date
  • September 1989 (1989-09) (TIFF)
Running time
108 minutes
CountryCanada
LanguageEnglish

The film stars Colleen Dewhurst and Megan Follows as Molly and Micheline Dushane, a mother and daughter living in a small Northern Ontario town.[2] Molly is an alcoholic, which creates tension between her and Micheline, while Micheline is a retail clerk and part-time prostitute who dreams of escaping her stifling small-town existence.[3] The film's cast also includes Gordon Clapp and Debra McGrath as Molly's son and daughter-in-law, as well as Gordon Pinsent in flashbacks as Molly's deceased husband and Micheline's father, who unsuccessfully attempted to kill Micheline before committing suicide.

The film premiered at the 1989 Toronto International Film Festival in September 1989.[4] Its second screening was at the inaugural Cinéfest Sudbury International Film Festival two weeks later.[5]

The film was nominated for six awards at the 11th Genie Awards: Best Picture, Best Actress (Dewhurst, Follows), Best Original Screenplay (Murphy), Best Overall Sound (Sal Grimaldi, Joe Grimaldi, Dino Pigat and Peter Shewchuk) and Best Sound Editing (Terry Burke, David Templeton, Ralph Brunjes, and Brian Ravok).[6]

Termini Station was filmed on location in Kirkland Lake, Ontario.[7]

Critical response

The film received mixed reviews from critics. Rick Groen of The Globe and Mail praised the ways in which King's background in documentary filmmaking had influenced the film's depiction of the "permanently half-finished look of the mid-North", but criticized the screenplay as melodramatic,[3] while Peter Goddard of the Toronto Star called the cast talented but wasted, and concluded that "Canadiana any more Gothic than this and you could put an Elmira stove in it and sell it in Harrowsmith."[8]

Marke Andrews of the Vancouver Sun wrote that the film's only redeeming quality was that it liberated Follows from her wholesome Anne of Green Gables image,[9] while Wendy Dudley of the Calgary Herald suggested that King's choice to cast Dewhurst and Follows together as a mother and daughter, so soon after the Anne of Green Gables films, was one of the film's biggest problems, concluding that "it's hard to accept Marilla as a drunk and Anne as a whore."[10]

The Los Angeles Times, conversely, acknowledged that the film "is stuck in the usual kitchen-sink realism that makes the Anglo-Canadian--as opposed to the often exciting Quebecois--cinema so often dull", but praised the cast, and Dewhurst in particular, for their performances.[11]

References
  1. "Film liberation folly for Follows". Vancouver Sun, November 1, 1989.
  2. "Follows plays hustler in new Allan King film: Termini Station is a 'cross between grand opera and the Marx Brothers'". The Globe and Mail, November 4, 1988.
  3. "Film Review: Termini Station". The Globe and Mail, September 29, 1989.
  4. "Megan Follows as hooker; Anne of Green Gables star takes different role in film series". Ottawa Citizen, September 13, 1989.
  5. "Extra seats needed at Cinefest". The Globe and Mail, September 27, 1989.
  6. "Rundown on the Genie hopefuls". Edmonton Journal, February 14, 1990.
  7. "Dewhurst a hot act in deep freeze". Toronto Star, December 17, 1988.
  8. "Talented cast wasted in boozy, passionless look at our identity". Toronto Star, September 29, 1989.
  9. "Follows film just dumb". Vancouver Sun, November 1, 1989.
  10. "You won't want to wait at the station". Calgary Herald, March 12, 1990.
  11. "MOVIE REVIEW : 'Termini Station,' Dewhurst's Last Film, Her Best". Los Angeles Times, December 13, 1991.
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