Customer Reviews

Canvas

5 star:		(16)
4 star:		(6)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

CANVAS is an autobiographical story by writer/director Joseph Greco and knowing that fact helps to forgive some of the weaknesses of the film. The story - how a family copes with the presence of paranoid schizophrenia and survives - comes from the heart and is as frank a film about the subject of mental illness as any out there. And for all the inherent tendencies to play it as a soap opera, the overriding effect is one of sharing lives challenged by the presence of a crushing disease.

Mary Marino (Marcia Gay Harden) has been afflicted with paranoid schizophrenia for nearly two years and her disease has affected her marriage to her working husband John (Joe Pantoliano in his best role to date) and her eleven year old son Chris (Devon Gearhart): John misses work to care for Mary and still pay for her mounting hospitalization and medical bills and Chris suffers abuse form his mocking school friends, frequently having to explain away his mother's erratic behavior. Mary paints (therapy) the same scene repeatedly, hears voices, and finally refuses to stay on her meds, a fact that results in her long-term hospitalization in a Psychiatric Hospital. John and Chris continue to love Mary despite the radical changes in their lives and each finds a means of coping: John goes on sick leave to build a sailboat for his wife and son in his backyard (he and Mary met and fell in love on a sailboat), and Chris takes up one of Mary's hobbies - sewing patches on shirts - and finds an audience and acceptance and income at his school. How the father and son survive and conquer their challenge presented by the mental illness of Mary serves to provide the ending to this story.

Each of the actors is excellent, especially Pantoliano. Harden is a solid actress but the script fails to capture the essence of her response to her disease. The film feels disjointed and inconsistent and has holes of undeveloped subplots and lines of thought that keep the movie grounded. But knowing that the story is true encourages the viewer to forgive the flaws and appreciate the tough subject matter that should help every viewer to better understand the effect of mental illness on a family. Grady Harp, February 08

I almost didn't see this film. I just tuned it in on Cablevision Movies on Demand. Oscar winner (for "Pollock") Marcia Gay Harden gives a bravura performance as Mary, the wife and mother who had suffered a psychotic break about 18 months before this story begins, and whose denial that she needs continuing medical help has begun to

lead her once again into bizarre behavior and paranoid delusions, to the extent that she's finally removed from her home by the local police, who have been there many times before. But Harden's portrayal is so nuanced that we can see the loving wife and mother and the scared person inside. As Mary's frustrated, but fiercly protective and loving husband John, Joey Pantoliano is first-rate. I know I've seen him in a lot of other things, but this was the film that made me realize exactly how good he is.

But Mary's illness is only part of the story. When she's hospitalized (and in the scene where John and son Chris first go to the psychiatric ward to see a heavily sedated Mary, Harden is heartbreaking), a new relationship has to be forged between Chris, who has been taunted at school about his "crazy" parents, and John, who is seriously worried about being able to pay Mary's mounting medical bills.

To me, this film is less about schizophrenia as it is about family and love, and the human connections that redeem us no matter what's happening on the outside. There is a lot of love in this film.

If you haven't seen Canvas, you should.

EDIT: There should be a soundtrack for this film, but I haven't been able to find it. Joel Goodman's score is worth hearing, and there are a couple of gorgeous songs sung by Lisbeth Scott.

I have to admit that it was hard for me to watch this movie. A little seven-year-old girl somehow found our family many years ago. When we learned that her mom suffered from schizophrenia we told her that whenever her mom was off her medicine, and she didn't make a meal, this little girl should come to our house and we'd feed her. Over the years, she also slept at our house many times. Her last day of high school she ate breakfast with our kids and said she was really going to miss those times as part of our family. [She, now successful in her work, still is an important part of our family over a decade later.] As I watched this movie, it was like watching our unofficial daughter's experience all over again.

I don't think I need to say more about the authenticity of this movie. I just wish we'd had this movie when this little girl was still ten. It would have helped two ways: it would have helped her to know that other kids had to deal with the same kind of mother as she, and it would have helped her to open up to us in healthy ways so we could counsel her in ways to cope. It is extremely difficult for a child to know they should (and do) love a mother that acts irrationally. Every child who has a schizophrenic parent should see this movie; all the better if he or she sees it with an adult who is capable of counseling the child.

Canvas the Movie does what few films have done. It depicts the struggles of a family member who is experiencing paranoid schezophrenia and it show the confused but loving attempts of the family members to in some way connect to their loved one and each other.

Never heard of this movie, but saw it on TV. What a sleeper this one must have been at the box office that I missed it. I'm a psych nurse and this has the honesty of the heart-wrenching struggles with psychophrenia that touches an entire family, and the sensitivity that protects the dignity of the victim(s) of this illness. It is beautifully and empathically developed and touchingly performed. Kudos to whomever did the screenplay. Genius.

This movie has been viewed by several of our Nami Wood County, Ohio members and we are now ordering several more copies to be placed in our library for organizations and other family members to view. We believe it is one of the most "real life" discriptions of how mental illness affects families. It's an "oscar" to us.
Carol A., President

'Canvas' is the most realistic film I've ever seen of what it's like for a family member to battle schizophrenia. Some parts were difficult to watch because they so realistically show what my loved-one goes through and how helpless one can feel regarding this illness.

The movie 'Beautiful Mind' allows you to step into the mind of a person battling schizophrenia. 'Canvas' was more like stepping into a family dealing with this illness.

Thankfully,along with the gutt-wrenching moments, the movie also shows that there can be good days during this struggle. The husband is shown having enormous love and patience for his wife. The film also shows that though the wife is struggling with this illness, she truly loves her husband and son. They each have hobbies that bring them pleasure and are a way of coping...painting,sailing,having friends. With these pleasant times portrayed and the music in the film, you will not only get to look in the window of a family dealing with mental illness,but you will be able to do it with some moments of smiling.

Mary (Marcia Gay Harden), seeming to be more eccentric than schizophrenic, is a happy person when she does not have her episodes where she hears voices, and believes that they are in danger and that the house is wired hence her paranoia. Her husband (Joe Pantoliano) looks after their young son when Mary is forcibly taken to a mental institution. As with many schizophrenics, they stop taking their medication when they feel well, and then they go downhill again. She eventually realizes that she needs to take her medication. She is close to her son, and very protective, to the point where it is embarrassing for him. The movie gives one a look into this family home, and you realize that there is a togetherness not found in many homes where all the family members are so called "normal". A very touching story.

I have empathy for the father and his son.My son and I have been there
Too bad this excellent film was not better marketed
excellent;ie the story, the cast and the background

The movie was sad but educational. I wish they showed more symptoms of the disorder instead of a just a little bit.