4 Movies Directed by Michael McGowan

Basic Info:

Cast:

Writer:

Fullplot:

It's the 1953/54 school year at St. Magnus Catholic School in Hamilton, Ontario. Fourteen year old Ralph Walker is in many ways a typical teenager. He is experimenting with smoking and is openly preoccupied with the opposite sex, which makes him the brunt of jokes amongst his male classmates and which constantly gets him into trouble with the school's strict headmaster, Father Fitzpatrick. As penance and to redirect his energies, Father Fitzpatrick orders Ralph to join the school's cross country running team under the tutelage of the school's avant-garde thinking teacher, Father Hibbert. Some of the more unusual circumstances of Ralph's life are that he lives by himself in the family home, telling the authorities that he is living with his paternal grandparents (who are in reality deceased), and telling his widowed hospitalized mother (Ralph's father was killed in the war) that he is staying with a friend. Ralph's focus in life changes after his mother falls into a coma. It will take a miracle for her to come out of that coma. After two unrelated and somewhat innocent comments made to Ralph by Father Hibbert on prayer, purity and faith and running the Boston Marathon, Ralph believes that that miracle will be him winning the 1954 Boston Marathon for which he only has 180 days to train. To obtain the necessary physical and spiritual requirements to achieve this goal, Ralph receives some help from his friends Claire Collins and Chester Jones, and from one of the hospital's compassionate nurses named Alice. Although he believes Ralph's mission is misguided, Father Hibbert, who has his own secret past running history, becomes Ralph's personal trainer. These actions place Father Hibbert and Ralph at odds with Father Fitzpatrick, who sees his and other authority figures' roles as needing to show Ralph his place in life.

Basic Info:

Cast:

Writer:

Fullplot:

Out of the blue, Ben learns he has stage IV cancer; survival, with treatment, is 10 percent. So this risk-averse, slow-to-act, quiet man buys a used motorcycle, says goodbye to Samantha, his baffled fiancèe, and heads west from Toronto. He imagines it's a quest for Grumps, a mythical figure from his childhood; he takes digital photos of various "world's largest" roadside attractions; he chats with strangers, including two women; his bike slips on a dead skunk on the highway. Calls to Samantha meet with pleading that he return for treatment and anger that he won't. He doesn't want to be a patient yet. But, will he make discoveries, and what about Grumps? What's important?

Basic Info:

Cast:

Writer:

Fullplot:

Seventeen-year-old Farley has led a sheltered life, raised on a diet of home schooling, organic living and trips to the art gallery. To his parents' dismay, Farley loves to play shinny with the local rink rats. To their even greater dismay, Farley is scouted and signed by the owner (Stephen McHattie) of a junior league team, where he becomes an instant star. But Farley discovers that stardom comes with a price-including the expectation to fight on the ice. Throw in a changing relationship with his best friend (Allie MacDonald), and Farley finds himself losing his way.

Basic Info:

Cast:

Writer:

Fullplot:

After years of stability, the lives of octogenarian couple, Craig and Irene Morrison, are slowly beginning to change. Because of changing times and regulations, they are no longer able to make a living from their small coastal New Brunswick farm. And Irene has begun to show signs of early dementia. Against the wishes of their two offspring who still reside in the area and who would like to see more standard care provided for Irene, Craig, the son of a master shipbuilder who inherited his father's building abilities, decides to mill lumber from trees on their property and with it build a more suitable, small one story house on the property in which he and Irene can live. Beginning this project with only a design in his mind, he is encouraged by friends at least to go through the regulatory process of building permits and the like. Despite being able to complete this project to more than exacting centuries old standards, Craig ends up hitting one roadblock after another in this regulatory process, which could kibosh this project, and his want for what he sees as a comfortable life with Irene in their final years.