First of all, I am a proud Canadian.
I liked the effort and the purpose that was put into the making of this film.
However I believe that apart from making jokes about the stereotypes, it doesn't teach much to non-Canadians.
Canada has a rich history and culture. Unfortunately there's little mention of the Canada before the Europeans, the real land belonging to our First Nations.
There's also little mention of the multiculturalism in Canada which is the essence of who we are. The filmmaker only interviews a few Americans and/or Canadian ex-pats who are mostly white and English-speaking.
When he himself hears that Canadian food is multicultural, he doesn't seem to accept it and is looking for one answer (hoping for something associated with "white English people"). He even goes on to say that when we include different cultures of our country as Canadian food we're merely being polite. He doesn't seem to appreciate that this "politeness" is a sense of connection and care that we typically have towards each other regardless of physical appearance, language, belief, gender etc.
He does not talk about or to many women, to noble prize winners, to famous researchers and....the list can go on and on.
This film seemed to me like a cheap, superficial and lazy work that's trying to compensate for the lack of information and depth by using F words. Luckily that gives me a reason to keep my child from watching it!
Robert Cohen's film taught me something: that unfortunately in Canada there still are people like him who don't know much about "being Canadian", let alone make a film about it to show the world.
I liked the effort and the purpose that was put into the making of this film.
However I believe that apart from making jokes about the stereotypes, it doesn't teach much to non-Canadians.
Canada has a rich history and culture. Unfortunately there's little mention of the Canada before the Europeans, the real land belonging to our First Nations.
There's also little mention of the multiculturalism in Canada which is the essence of who we are. The filmmaker only interviews a few Americans and/or Canadian ex-pats who are mostly white and English-speaking.
When he himself hears that Canadian food is multicultural, he doesn't seem to accept it and is looking for one answer (hoping for something associated with "white English people"). He even goes on to say that when we include different cultures of our country as Canadian food we're merely being polite. He doesn't seem to appreciate that this "politeness" is a sense of connection and care that we typically have towards each other regardless of physical appearance, language, belief, gender etc.
He does not talk about or to many women, to noble prize winners, to famous researchers and....the list can go on and on.
This film seemed to me like a cheap, superficial and lazy work that's trying to compensate for the lack of information and depth by using F words. Luckily that gives me a reason to keep my child from watching it!
Robert Cohen's film taught me something: that unfortunately in Canada there still are people like him who don't know much about "being Canadian", let alone make a film about it to show the world.