The Shipping News (2002)

The Shipping News is an odd, fast-moving comedic drama filled with unusual relationships, deep dark secrets, and amazing, refreshing scenery. The opening scene makes you want to swim for the surface while watching a boy learning to dog paddle, the hard way. His sadistic father tossed him in the brink and observed, unconcerned, as his son sank beneath the surface.

The movie gets better from there but still is full of drownings, with water playing its role to quiet the human spirit. The main character, a dysfunctional survivor named Quoyle (Kevin Spacey) still drowns in his sea of insecurity and timidity, the product of his father’s cruelty. He says, “I got used to being invisible until someone noticed me.”

Unfortunately for him, the woman who noticed him was more dysfunctional than he was, but in other ways. Enter the devastatingly beautiful and seductive Petal (Cate Blanchett.) Petal’s shallow take on life included drifting selfishly from lover to lover, unlovingly helping Quoyle raise a sweet child, Bunny, along the way.

This movie, set in a picturesque Newfoundland fishing village, is about transformation, revival, and hope.

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