My Thunder Bay

This is not so much a movie review, more like a reflection. I saw Guy Maddin’s My Winnipeg at the tail end of TIFF this year. I went to this “docu-fantasia” (as the director deemed it) without knowing what to expect and not having read up much on it. So my first impression was that of seeing a college film project: a pretentious free verse poem on screen. The first part sets the tone, then the film dives into the personal history of the narrator (Maddin, himself) and blends with tidbits of the city’s past. Part of me was worried that this stylized documentary would grow tiresome 20 minutes in; it didn’t.

What it did do was remind me of my hometown: My Thunder Bay. It describes a strong and desperate need to break free from a town trying too hard and remaining so cold. The kind of town where there are urban legends that, though embarrassing and possibly bizarre, you can’t wait to tell big city folk about. One that, if anything, is a safe haven for childhood memories that can never be so easily torn down like the local hockey arena or swimming complex. Despite wanting to leave that town at a young and fiery age, you yearn to have those memories rebuilt and relived.

This is Any Town, Canada.