Open Road Entertainment

The Fishing Trip

CINEACTION (Issue 69 2006)

“A possible touchstone here is the work of Ingmar Bergman (of whose films The Fishing Trip occasionally reminded me…) – Robin Wood

VUE WEEKLY (3/19/99)

“…astounding… Watching The Fishing Trip was an epiphanous experience for me, renewing my faith in human creativity and reminding me that while, sure, Shakespeare in Love was a lovely little movie, it’s possible to get the right people together and spend just a few thousand dollars and create something that touches the viewer’s soul to its fundamental core…a deep, powerful study of the human psyche…a film that will stay with me for a long, long time.” – David Gobeil Taylor

OTTAWA X-PRESS (12/04/98)

“…a girl-powered road movie with a gutsy agenda…The Fishing Trip’s sullen young trio are out to bell the masculine beast in its lair. Stunningly imbibed with life by first-time film actors [the film offers] proof that in indie filmmaking, the best hook is still a sharp script with fully-realized characters and spit-real dialogue.” – T.S.Warren

NATIONAL POST (11/13/98)

“a bare but austerely elegant feature film debut…The emotion the movie expends is fully real, earned by a taut script and a fine sense of pace and direction. Erwin, Hood and Henry punctuate their emotions finely, allowing their director’s small suggestions to take over where the movie might have bolted into pathos.” – Dan Glover

TORONTO STAR (11/13/98)

“A minor marvel of dramatic economy… The Fishing Trip compensates for its bleakness with the honesty of its performances. Using the road as a metaphor for a psychotherapeutic trek into a troubled past, Buchbinder wisely lets his actors (fueled by M.A. Lovretta’s pungent script) do most of the driving. There is little that is inessential to the dramatic business at hand, and the tight focus makes the meager scale of the enterprise – shot so cheaply the director couldn’t afford rushes – seem less a necessity than a virtue. …the film never lets its close-up concentration on the churning emotional states of the women waver.  …these are people bearing all the prickles and burrs of the emotionally ravaged, which is why they stick to you long after the journey has ended.” – Geoff Pevere

“The Fishing Trip is a Keeper. …fine, fresh performances from three young Canadian actresses who make the surprisingly well-written characters into people you care about and want to watch.” – Judy Gerstel (9/12/98)

GLOBE AND MAIL (11/13/98)

” *** An accomplished first feature…It’s to the credit of director Amnon Buchbinder and his first-time scriptwriter, M.A. Lovretta, that they resist the predictable outcome in favour of a messy and incomplete catharsis. It’s just as wrenching, and more convincing.” – Ray Conlogue

SEE MAGAZINE, EDMONTON (3/18/99)

” ****At first glance, The Fishing Trip seems like a chick road-trip movie about getting over childhood trauma. That’s precisely what it’s about. But the beauty of the film is in the details. The casting, the setting, the staging – it all falls into place…This is by no means a light-hearted date movie, but it is one hell of a film.” – Jill Dixon

GLOBE AND MAIL (9/10/98)

“Truly gritty performances.” – Liam Lacey

MACLEANS MAGAZINE (9/05/98)

“The Fishing Trip is spare, earnest drama with no tricks but a lot of emotional power. Making his debut feature, director Amnon Buchbinder draws exceptional performances from the two teenagers, whose characters develop an uncanny bond.” – Brian D. Johnson

TORONTO SUN (11/16/98)

“…The Fishing Trip has a lot of things going for it. Three things in particular are remarkable and imbue director Amnon Buchbinder’s film with its admirably tortured soul: the splendid performances of three young actresses whose characters live in the core of this drama about a family’s dirty secrets.”  – Bruce Kirkland

EDMONTON JOURNAL  (3/19/99)

“The Fishing Trip is a tough-minded affair. It’s deftly written…Hollywood would have had a violent conclusion with bullets flying and blood flowing, but Buchbinder and screenwriter M.A. Lovretta go for something much different and more satisfying and subtle. What works best, however, are the performances of Erwin, Hood and Henry, all of whom make their characters memorable.” – Marc Horton

OTTAWA CITIZEN (12/04/98)

“a tough-minded road movie that rises above its simple structure and low budget to become an austere and at times riveting drama…taut, not to say grueling…it contains a power that is undeniable.” – Jay Stone

VARIETY WEEKLY (11/30/98)

“Standout performances by the three unknown leads are the best things about The Fishing Trip. Jhene Erwin, and especially teenage thesps Melissa Hood and Anna Henry are raw, intense and entirely believable as three young women trying to come to grips with their abusive families. First-time feature director Amnon Buchbinder, a Toronto cinema professor, and screenwriter M.A. Lovretta, a former student, set up a compelling drama…Buchbinder effectively lets the story develop at its own pace, and he and scripter Lovretta subtly paint the fraught relationships among the three women.” – Brendan Kelly

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My Gentleman Friends

THE GLOBE AND MAIL (04/07/99)

“It’s funny how people in the TV business can’t quite bring themselves to do what they think they should do. Network executives talk constantly about making edgy, dangerous original programming. And then they lose heart and give us the same old stuff. Moze Mossanen’s new film My Gentleman Friends…definitely isn’t the same old stuff…And that’s what allows My Gentleman Friends to stand out so proudly.” – John Allemang

THE GLOBE AND MAIL (05/03/99)

“Moze Mossanen’s fictional portrait of three aging but still catty gay dancers earns a welcome repeat performance on Bravo!” – John Allemang

THE NATIONAL POST (04/05/99)

“…a sharp, funny movie…that completely ducks the smarminess bogging down recent movies about the lives of gay men…” – Katrina Onstad

THE GLOBE AND MAIL, BROADCAST WEEK (April 3 – 9, 1999)

“…a substantial film…an interesting, intricate and layered film that aims high.” – John Doyle
(Also chosen as Doyle’s best bet)

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Year of the Lion

THE GLOBE AND MAIL, BROADCAST WEEK (January 18 – 24, 2003)

“…Mossanen and Mrozewski chose to take the basic premise of Dangerous Liaisons as a starting point, and from there push the story in both conventional and entirely fresh directions…Despite the odds, Year of the Lion manages to deliver an invigorating new take – both in form and content – on the classic morality tale.” – Victor Dwyer

THE NATIONAL POST (01/23/03)

“…remarkable achievement…Fans of the book will enjoy deciphering the parallels, but Year of the Lion can stand alone as a searing chronicle of human lust, evocatively detailed by Mrozewski’s choreography and Mossanen’s gift for framing dance on film.” – Michael Crabb

Xtra (01/09/03)

“It’s hard to point precisely to what it is that Mossanen has hit upon to arrive at such success. Perhaps emptying the work of all dialogue did the trick. Certainly he has gathered together a cast and crew of enviable skill and talent. With this work, he raises the bar for what he calls cine-dance.” – Nicholas Davies