This 26 minute short drama is a production of the National Film Board of Canada, and depicts, in rather bare bones fashion, the struggle for survival of an Irish immigrant family in the early 19th century as they battle the elements during their first winter in Canada, in the Ottawa Valley.
The bare bones is understandable. It is, after all, only 26 minutes long. So, the film gives us a sense of some of the struggles, but not really a lot of the details. The story revolves around a mother and her two children, the father having left for the winter to work in a logging camp. They deal with cold, little food, wild animals and sickness as they await the coming of spring. They find both solace and strength in their religious faith and in their culture, whose language they can now use, since it had been banned in Ireland by the British.
A lot of this is narrated by Sharon O'Niell, who plays the teenage daughter. I'd have liked to have seen it a bit longer actually, so that it could have provided a little more detail; a little more story. As it is, it's a glimpse of a very different time when life was hard and survival wasn't a given. (5/10)
