The acting is excellent, the sets are excellent, and the story is interesting, but there is an overwhelming 'Canadianess' about the film, like it's a giant heritage minute. There was something lacking in the script and direction that held the film back.
The storyline moves from 1913 to 1940, but there is never quite enough back story to fully develop the characters nor enough dialogue to understand context. The onset of the Depression is not defined; there are suffragettes in the 1930s when most Canadian women already have the right to vote (Inserting a conversation about Quebec women not having the vote like their English Canadian counterparts would have helped.) A confusing scene at the beginning of the film shows her being admonished by a priest until he is paid off with cash from the box office. But this is how her road show made money - by playing in rural parish halls across French-speaking Quebec, Ontario, the Maritimes, and New England, but that isn't clear from this scene. The only anti-English sentiment is expressed by her husband when he tells the family to stop listening to the CBC, but it is never understood why he feels this way...
One of the best devices used for the back story is to show her constant state of child bearing during the first 15 years of marriage. Mary and Edward Bolduc are poor, but in classic Catholic duty, they have a dozen children of which only four survive. Mary is shown pregnant, in labour and burying child after child, in an almost comedic string of short scenes that moves the story from 1913 to 1928. It's only when she stops having children that her career as a famous singer/songwriter begins to take off.
Debbie Lynch-White, who plays La Bolduc is amazing. She ages believably from 19 to 41 and sings all the songs, sounding very much like the original. Without her, the film would have failed. But all the actors are equally as good in their supporting roles. This could have been a great film, rather than 143 Heritage minutes.
