"Canvas" sails on power of performances
BY MARLI GUZZETTA INDEPENDENT ARTS EDITOR
In a scene of Joe Greco's full-length drama, "Canvas," Mary Marino (Marcia Gay Harden) lies down next to her son, Chris, and asks, "Do you remember me before? … When a big wave came, you would come running to me."

Joe Pantoliano, Devon Gearhart and Marcia Gay Harden in "Canvas"

Writing professors sometimes say that every good story has one sentence that contains the essence, the genetic material, of the entire narrative. A schizophrenic, Mary is based on Greco's own mother. The question that she poses to Chris is that seed of everything, glowing with the sea-blue nostalgia each character has for the time before Mary began manifesting symptoms.

Joe Pantoliano has created a strong and sympathetic character in John Marino, a father and husband performing the daily heroics of trying to find the best care for his wife while putting a brave but happy face on the situation for his son, Chris, played with depth by the young Devon Gearhart.

"I've loved Joey ever since I saw him in 'Empire of the Sun.' I wanted to give him the opportunity to do something different than his usual role, said Greco, who finds it difficult to speak about the character of 10-year-old Chris, because he feels "too close to me."

"Devon did a good job at capturing the innocence of Chris, and the vulnerability," Greco said. "He did what I wanted him to do, as far as being in those moments and responding to them as honestly as possible."

One of the things that gives Chris added dimension is the fact that Greco allows the boy to reminisce, an activity that children do far more in reality than most films ever show. Chris begins skipping school to return to the beach and the lighthouse where he remembers happier days with his mother, before her first schizophrenic break.

"This boy is all too keenly aware that there was a better time," Greco said. "And he misses that moment he knew. I felt it was dramatically necessary, to see him reminisce. … The son, just like the father, longing for the past to make it all better."

In Mary's absence, the two men also take up their own creative projects - Chris picks up his mother's habit of sewing patches onto T-shirts, while John - broke and fallen on hard times at work - begins building from scratch a sailboat for his family, a kind of ark to save them from the flood of their despair and carry them off into a more hopeful future.

Unlike other filmmakers who create Florida with establishing shots and then California soundstages, Greco actually did go home to Hollywood, Florida to shoot the movie. His establishing shots and everything in between constitute the South Florida with which South Floridians are familiar - from the railroad tracks along Dixie Highway, to the sprinkler - stained sidewalks and massive late afternoon cumulous clouds. Together, the story and backdrop have a hint of Frank Conroy's "Stop Time."

"I know filmmakers like John Sayles believe this to be true, location is a character," Greco said. "I wanted to show the Florida I grew up with, the Florida that I don't see in movies."

In the same way that he lets the setting talk, Greco also eschewed "camera tricks" to stress the actors' performances. "My goal is to make the audience forget the camera, and feel as if they are watching a documentary, not a feature."

Greco was hesitant at first to make such a personal film. "Because I didn't want to do anything that would hurt or cause pain to my family. Those are the feelings I had early on in the process," Greco said. "It took a while to get it off the ground, which allowed me to grow as a filmmaker and also gain some objectivity. Those ethical questions I had as a young writer, sort of fell away. Then I realized the best thing I could do was tell the emotional truth."

One of the best compliments an actor can receive, being cast to play the director's beloved mother, was given to Marcia Gay Harden, whom Greco cast for her "uncanny ability to elicit compassion from an audience, no matter what character she is playing."

"I wanted the audience to laugh with Mary and not at her," Greco said.

Greco showed his mother the film before it premiered at the Hamptons Film Festival. "She loves the movie," he said. "We all have this connection to mental health, and it's not talked about as much as it should be, and hopefully in talking about it, people can get the help they need and know

they're not alone." I
When: Fri., June 15, 12:30 p.m.;
Sun., June 17, 3 p.m.
Where: Bennett Hall (Friday);
Unitarian Church (Sunday)
Cost: $12
For tickets go to
www.nantucketfilmfestival.org,
or stop by the American Legion
Hall at 21 Washington St.