| The Hanging Garden | |
|---|---|
 Promotional poster | |
| Directed by | Thom Fitzgerald |
| Written by | Thom Fitzgerald |
| Produced by | Thom Fitzgerald Louise Garfield Arnie Gelbart |
| Starring | Chris Leavins Troy Veinotte Sarah Polley Peter MacNeill Seana McKenna |
| Cinematography | Daniel Jobin |
| Edited by | Susan Shanks |
| Music by | John Roby |
| Distributed by | Alliance Communications (Canada) Alliance Releasing (United Kingdom) |
Release date |
|
Running time | 91 minutes |
| Language | English |
| Budget | $1,500,000CAD |
The Hanging Garden is a British-Canadian drama film, written and directed byThom Fitzgerald and released in 1997.[1] Fitzgerald's feature debut, the film was shot inNova Scotia.
The film's central character is Sweet William, as both a thin adult and a fat teenager. Its plot hinges on a fateful incident from his teenage years, when his grandmother caught him attempting to have sex with his bisexual friend Fletcher, involuntarily outing him to his dysfunctional family asgay.
As a consequence of the ensuing rejection, particularly by his alcoholic father Whiskey Mac, Sweet William faced the difficult decision of whether to run away to live in a big city far away from his family, or to commitsuicide by hanging himself from a tree in the family garden. The film's themes about the duality of life and death, and the way seemingly very different choices in life can lead to similar outcomes, are portrayed throughmagic realism in the film's depiction of a complex merged reality in which William appears to have successfully made both choices at the same time.[2]
The film is told as atriptych. In the first segment, set in the present, the adult Sweet William has returned home to rural Nova Scotia for the first time since leaving ten years earlier, to attend the wedding of his sister Rosemary to Fletcher. However, upon his return, he makes two unexpected discoveries: he can still see his younger selves living there and walking around the house, and he also has a new young pre-teen sister named Violet, whom he has never met because she was born after he left. The second segment, set in the past, tells the story of Sweet William's teenage years leading up to the critical decision, including his bond with Rosemary and their mother Iris's struggles to protect her children from Whiskey Mac's abuse, as well as revealing the truth of Violet's origins, before ending with Sweet William's suicide. Returning to the present, the final segment features both the living adult and dead teenage Sweet William present in the same reality – and the dead body is not just in his imagination, because the rest of his family can also see it still hanging from the tree.[3]
According to Fitzgerald, "To every event in the film there are two interpretations. He left home and now he's back and his memory is haunting them. Or he did commit suicide when young and his homecoming is a fantasy?"[4]
The film premiered at the1997 Toronto International Film Festival.[5]
It subsequently screened at the 1997Atlantic Film Festival,[6] the 1997Cinéfest Sudbury International Film Festival,[7] and the 1997Vancouver International Film Festival.[8]
It premiered in the United States at the 1998Sundance Film Festival,[9] before going into wider theatrical release.
Roger Ebert favourably reviewed the film, writing that "It may be magic realism, but isn't it also the simple truth? Don't the ghosts of our former selves attend family events right along with our current manifestations? Don't parents still sometimes relate to us as if we were children, don't siblings still carry old resentments, aren't old friends still stuck on who we used to be? And don't we sometimes resurrect old personas and dust them off for a return engagement? Aren't all of those selves stored away inside somewhere?"[10]
ForVariety, Brendan Kelly wrote that "'The Hanging Garden' is often in danger of seeming overly pretentious, but Fitzgerald wisely undercuts the formal artiness with strong, emotional storytelling. In many ways, this is a simple yarn of a son dealing with the usual family demons and, on that level, is an affecting piece of filmmaking. Beyond that, the mix of film-school formalism and down-to-earth drama makes the pic a unique offering."[3]
In 2001, an industry poll conducted byPlayback named it the 11th best Canadian film of the preceding 15 years.[11]
Asoundtrack album was released in 1997 onVirgin Music Canada.[18]