Keris Hope Hill and Mélanie Bray in a scene from Rosie.Ramona Diaconescu/Assini Productions Inc.
Rosie
Written and directed by Gail Maurice
Starring Melanie Bray, Keris Hope Hill and Brandon Oakes
Classification N/A; 92 minutes
Opens in select theatres Nov. 11
Critic’s Pick
There are few moments in life that usher in a kind of forced adulthood as quickly as becoming a parent. As soon as you’re responsible for housing and feeding a kid, you’ve got little choice but to grow up, and fast. At least that’s the idea behind the new coming-of-age indie, Rosie. And while quite a few films have grappled with this idea, few recent ones have done so with as much heart or charm as this one by Canadian writer-director Gail Maurice.
Frédérique Renault (Melanie Bray) or Fred as she’s known to her friends is a perpetually unemployed, long-suffering artist who is three months behind on rent and counting on a new job at a sex shop to help dig her out of this financial hole. Unfortunately, life has other plans for Fred, as she’s visited by a child services agent on the job, who informs her that following the death of her adopted sister, she’s now the guardian of her young niece Rosie (Keris Hope Hill).
Until this moment Fred wasn’t even aware of Rosie’s existence, let alone played the part of doting aunt, so it’s not exactly a welcome surprise. Fred is jobless and houseless within hours of meeting young Rosie, hardly ready to take on the role of parent. But amongst the tight-knit artists and bohemians of 1980s Montreal, Fred has a fierce community made up of friends Flo (Constant Bernard) and Mo (Alex Trahan), who close ranks to ensure Rosie and Fred feel safe and surrounded by love.
While you get glimpses into the lives of each member of this unlikely family, it’s really Fred and Rosie at the heart of the tale.Assini Productions Inc.
While the film gives us glimpses into the lives of each member of this unlikely family, as Flo struggles to gain her father’s acceptance for her chosen gender and Mo is desperately trying to overcome a lack of confidence to follow their dreams, it’s really Fred and Rosie at the heart of this tale.
Fred is wrestling with a lifetime’s worth of guilt from abandoning her sister Julie, Rosie’s mother, while they were teens. Julie, a victim of the “Sixties Scoop” that saw Indigenous children stolen from their families and placed in the foster system, forgave Fred, but Fred struggles, even now, to forgive herself. Rosie, meanwhile, is searching for a connection to her mother and her Cree heritage, an answer to the puzzle of identity that becomes increasingly difficult to find when the only connection to the past no longer exists.
As Rosie, Hope Hill’s charm is infectious and her smile manages to melt even the frigid, reluctant heart of her aunt Fred.Ramona Diaconescu/Assini Productions Inc.
At times Rosie feels a little muddled, a little disconnected from the story it’s trying to tell and a shoestring budget and sparse script keep it from hitting all the right notes. Still, the cast’s obvious chemistry, charm and heartfelt performances gave it a critical buzz and even led to sold-out screenings when it premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival in September.
Seven-year-old Hope Hill is particularly remarkable in the titular role, offering this otherwise rough-around-the-edges, ragtag group of misfits an innocent perspective that reframes them as beautiful, misunderstood stars, legends in the making. As Rosie, Hope Hill’s charm is infectious and her smile manages to melt even the frigid, reluctant heart of her aunt Fred. With this film, Maurice has shown what she can do with a tender story. But with the discovery of Hope Hill, she’s launched a future star.