Falling Over Backwards

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Falling Over Backwards
Directed by Mort Ransen
Produced byMort Ransen
Stewart Harding
Starring Saul Rubinek
Julie Saint-Pierre
Helen Hughes
Paul Soles
CinematographySavas Kalogeras
Edited byRita Roy
Music by Milan Kymlicka
Production
company
Moving Image Productions
Distributed by Astral Films
Release date
  • August 23, 1990 (1990-08-23)(MWFF)
Running time
100 minutes
CountryCanada
LanguageEnglish

Falling Over Backwards is a Canadian comedy film, directed by Mort Ransen and released in 1990. [1]

Contents

Plot

The film stars Saul Rubinek as Mel Rosenblum, a newly divorced schoolteacher suffering a mid-life crisis, who decides to reconstruct the happier times in his life by engineering the reunion of his divorced parents Harvey (Paul Soles) and Rose (Helen Hughes). [2] Meanwhile, Mel himself is drawn into a nascent relationship with Jackie (Julie Saint-Pierre), his landlady, which is complicated when Jackie discovers that she is pregnant by her previous boyfriend and considers having an abortion. [3]

Cast

Reception

The film was compared by critics to a Jewish version of a Michel Tremblay play. [4] Ransen described it as the film that led to his decision to leave the National Film Board to work as an independent director, as he could not imagine the board approving the project. [5]

The film received two Genie Award nominations at the 12th Genie Awards in 1991, for Best Supporting Actor (Soles) and Best Sound Editing (Gudrun Christian, Andy Malcolm, Michelle Cooke, Abby Jack Neidik and Diane Le Floch).

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References

  1. "Director Ransen's film grim yet still playful". Halifax Daily News , April 9, 1991.
  2. "Set in Montreal, Falling Over Backwards is honest little film". Montreal Gazette , August 28, 1990.
  3. "Romantic comedy ends poorly". Calgary Herald , March 14, 1991.
  4. "Feel-good film examines the feel-awful '90s; Montreal director, cast bent over backwards to make Falling Over Backwards". Edmonton Journal , April 10, 1991.
  5. "Director finds vision on Plateau; Montrealer realizes dream of making feel-good '50s flick with feel-bad problems of '90s". Montreal Gazette , April 5, 1991.