The Tracey Fragments (film)

The Tracey Fragments
Directed by Bruce McDonald
Produced by Sarah Timmins
Written by Maureen Medved
Based on The Tracey Fragments
by Maureen Medved
Starring
Music by Broken Social Scene
Cinematography Steve Cosens
Edited by
  • Jeremy Munce
  • Gareth C. Scales
Distributed by Odeon Films
Release date
  • February 8, 2007 (2007-02-08) (Berlin)
  • November 2, 2007 (2007-11-02) (Canada)
Running time
 77 minutes
Country Canada
Language English
Budget CAD$750,000
Box office $52,000

The Tracey Fragments is a 2007 drama film directed by Canadian Bruce McDonald and written by Maureen Medved, based on her novel of the same name. It stars Ellen Page in the title role, who tries to find her little brother, and is produced by Sarah Timmins and executive produced by Paul Barkin.

Plot

15-year-old Tracey Berkowitz (Ellen Page) is in her underwear under a tattered shower curtain at the back of a bus, looking for her little brother Sonny (Zie Souwand), who thinks he's a dog.

Tracey's journey leads into the dark underbelly of the city, into the emotional cesspool of her home, through the brutality of her high school, the clinical cat-and-mouse games with her shrink and her soaring fantasies of Billy Zero (Slim Twig) - her rock and roll saviour. Her travels also put her in contact with the seedier inhabitants of the city, like Lance (Maxwell McCabe-Lokos), her would-be saviour who ultimately puts her life in jeopardy.

Tracey's stories begin to intertwine truth with lies, and hope with despair, as she moves closer to the truth of Sonny's disappearance.

Cast

Release

The film was selected to open the Panorama section of the 57th Berlin International Film Festival and had its world premiere February 8, 2007. It was distributed in Canada by Odeon Films, with world sales were handled by Bavaria Films International. The film had its North American premiere at the 2007 Toronto International Film Festival on September 12. Canadian theatrical release followed in October 2007. The film was acquired for the United States by THINKFilm, and was released May 9, 2008.[1] After a screening at the Possible Worlds 2007 Canadian Film Festival, the film was acquired for DVD release in Australia and New Zealand by Siren Visual.

The film was a low budget production, being made on only CAD$750,000.

Music

The score is composed by and features music from Canadian indie rock group Broken Social Scene. The soundtrack also features Peaches, Foals, The FemBots, Slim Twig, Duchess Says, Rose Melberg and "Land Horses", a cover version of Patti Smith's "Horses" by Land of Talk's Elizabeth Powell.

Tracey Re:fragmented

Tracey Re:fragmented is a project by the director and producers that made available all footage from the film shoot to download and remix into "their own related projects, including music videos, new trailers or to re-edit the entire movie themselves". The footage was released under a Creative Commons licence[2] as four torrents, each approximately four gigabytes in size. A contest was held for the best use of the footage from August 2007 until January 2008, with the winning material being included on the DVD release, including a video by Ottawa-based punk band Sedatives.[3]

Adaptation

The movie was adapted into a comic book, also called The Tracey Fragments.[4] The comic was available for free during some early screenings of the film.

Critical reception

On Rotten Tomatoes, the film has a rating of 36%, based on 33 reviews, with an average rating of 4.9/10. The site's critical consensus reads, "Splitscreen intensive and at times ambiguous, this Ellen Page vehicle cum psychodrama takes audacious risks that may confuse."[5] On Metacritic, the film holds a score of 54 out of 100, based on 10 reviews, indicating "mixed or average reviews".[6]

Awards and nominations

  • 2007: won the Manfred Salzgeber Award, and chosen as the opening film for the Berlin International Film Festival, Berlin Panorama section
  • September 2007: Atlantic Film Festival: Best Canadian Feature, Ellen Page, Best Actress
  • January 28, 2008: 28th Annual Genie Awards by the Academy of Canadian Cinema and Television (ACCT). 6 nominations including:
    • Achievement in Direction - Bruce McDonald
    • Achievement in Editing - Jeremiah Munce, Gareth C. Scales
    • Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role - Ellen Page
    • Achievement in Overall Sound - John Hazen, Matt Chan, Brad Dawe
    • Achievement in Sound Editing - Steven Munro, John Sievert, David Drainie Taylor
    • Adapted Screenplay - Maureen Medved

References

  1. ↑ Apple - Trailers - The Tracey Fragments
  2. ↑ Parkins, Cameron (2007-10-29). "Tracey: Re-Fragmented - Creative Commons" (Blog). Creative Commons. Retrieved 2008-06-03.
  3. ↑ "The Tracey Fragments Official site". Retrieved 2008-06-02.
  4. ↑ Index of comic at the GCD
  5. ↑ "The Tracey Fragments Movie Reviews, Pictures - Rotten Tomatoes". Rotten Tomatoes. Retrieved 2008-05-09.
  6. ↑ "The Tracey Fragments". Metacritic. Retrieved 2008-05-09.
This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.