by Jason Daniel Baker

Created on: March 24, 2007   Last Updated: January 09, 2011

The Highwayman (2000) Starring Laura Harris, Stephen McHattie, Jason Priestley, Linda Griffiths, Tracey Cook, Lou Gossett Jr.,Gordon Michael Woolvett, Bernie Coulson, Peter Keleghan, Heidi von Palleske, Wayne Robson, Eric Moreau, Tricia Williams, Clinton Walker, Michael Dyson, Nathalie Toriel, Joan Henry, Boyd Banks, Michael Johnson, Andy Pandoff, Callum Keith Rennie, Jennifer Vey, Michael George, Donald Burda, Nicolas Van Burek.

Directed by Keoni Waxman.

Running Time: 94 minutes.

Rating: R (Coarse Language, Violence)

Hapless, middle-aged sadsack Frank Drake (Stephen McHattie) in on the biggest losing streak of his long and difficult life. He loses his job, his wife (Von Palleske) and his home in the same day. To top it off his former boss Phil Bishop (Lou Gossett Jr., the only American in the cast) who was particularly cruel to him has also framed him for telemarketing fraud and Ziggy Watson (Harris), a disturbed young woman  and her even crazier friends insist she is Frank's long lost daughter and kidnap him.

A Marvel! A Canadian film, set in Canada with an almost exclusively Canadian cast. The very talented cast assembled for this production includes Canadian stalwarts Linda Griffiths as the landlady from hell, Tracey Cook as Gossett's moll and Jason Priestley as an American gun wacko named Breakfast. Peter Keleghan, Heidi von Palleske, Wayne Robson, Callum Keith Rennie are the cast too making this film a display of Canadian national treasures.

Laura Harris as always is thoroughly charming and the camera adoes her. You gotta love it when such a thoroughly talented performer like this comes from Canada and has film career success. What a beautiful woman too. Those that think Canadians aren't sexy either never met Laura Harris or don't know she's Canadian.

Jason Priestley is convincing like he is in most of his performances adding Canadian content for the tax credit and teenage girl appeal for American producers and distributors.

It is indeed grand when we can tell our own stories in Canada with our own people and actually have it come off looking like, at least, a medium-budget feature film.

Lou Gossett Jr., as always, gives an interesting performance as the jerk boss. But he's still a bloody Yank! It would be nice if we could have a 100 percent Canadian cast. Eric Petersen  would've done at least as good a job in Gossett's role as would Donnelly Rhodes or Alan Scarfe or Kenneth Welsh or even maybe Jack Langedijk.

Learn more about this author, Jason Daniel Baker.
Click here to send this author comments or questions.