Tribeca ’07: Blue State (review)

He’ll be gone in four years! / And then we’ll have to get ready for Jeb!

Ah, finally, a romantic comedy for those of us who live in, as we crazy leftwing nutjobs like to say, the reality-based community. After the 2004 election, despondent Kerry campaign worker John (Breckin Meyer: Garfield: A Tail of Two Kitties) is about to make good on his promise to move to Canada if Bush won reelection. The good folks up North who run MarryACanadian.ca invite John to come visit Winnipeg, maybe find himself a wife among the friendly gals ready to help a nice young American get his citizenship. Ah, but a complication rears its pretty head in Chloe (Anna Paquin [X-Men: The Last Stand], who also served as an executive producer on the film), a stranger along to share the driving from San Francisco and up over the border. The tropes of romantic comedies are never far from writer-director Marshall Lewy’s charming film, but what distinguishes it is how grounded it is in real world, in real people of the here and now, which lends it a bit more gravitas than you’d expect. John’s genuine passion for politics clashes with Chloe’s secret silence -- and they both clash with the Canadians’ condescension -- till facades are stipped away and raw emotion is all that’s left.

(Technorati tags: Blue State, Breckin Meyer, Anna Paquin, Tribeca Film Festival)