One Week (2008)

So much average

Simply Perfect

The performances transcend the film's tropes, grounding it in characters that feel more complete than this subgenre often produces.

By the time the dramatic fireworks start popping off, each one feels earned.

I was recommended this film by a friend. While watching this film I started contemplating my friend's taste, sanity and finally our very friendship. I later realize that I had been trolled.I saw that it had a good rating and good reviews. 11% seem to think this is a 10 star film. Another 11 think it's 9/10, while 23% think it's 8/10.I am not one of those people to say "I wish I could give it minus 10" or to give any work of art zero. I won't give this film 1/10, but 2 is what it really deserves.This film is not a work of art. It's what people call Canuxpolitation. It is an exploitation film on one side and a by-the-numbers checklist-inspired money-grab. People see big budget films with unnecessary violence, nudity, sexuality, action and cameos and see a cash-grab for what it really is.This is exactly that but on a smaller scale. Instead of big names we get cameos. Instead of unnecessary nudity we get unnecessary Canadiana. Instead of a glimpse of a breast, we get a glimpse of the Stanley Cup. Checklist hockey, nature, indie emo music, thinly veiled product placement (the whole adventure was inspired by a Burger King subsidiary called Tim Hourtons).It's insincere, intellectually dishonest, chest-thumping patriotism done by an emo with soft filters, capitalism and commercialism branded as pure love of one's homeland.Let me say this again, it's a movie where a man with cancer is inspired by a Burger King subsidiary to leave his job, partner and family to go on a ridiculous adventure.It's shameless product placement, one step away from Mac and Me.I was surprised this McGowan guy did not shoehorn in references to the invention of insulin or basketball, but I'm guessing he's more of the person to mention Blackberry, IMAX, Molson, VIA Rail or A&W.Product placement film and Tourism Canada advertisement for the age of ad- block.

A Canadian man discovers he has cancer. He buys a motorbike and goes to Tim Hortons to buy a cup of coffee. He rolls up the rim that tells him "Go West" - so he heads West. You start with a cliché and it doesn't stop there.Bike trip. Lots of open road, nature, etc. Postcard as a film. A tourism promo masquerading as a film.Meets a random stranger who also had cancer. What are the chances? Lots of Canada clichés. Meets some kids who ask him (of all people) where's the nearest Canadian Tire.Meets a cowgirl and goes horseback riding. Meets a girl and they have a moment by a campfire, singing French Canadian songs(!!).Random animals. Random forest stuff. He falls asleep and is awoken by a Native American drumming ritual. Token wise old native man? Check.So we've included nature, Quebec (folk song), Natives, nature, sunsets, cowgirls, forests, animals, nature, Tim Hortons, what's left? Swims in a lake. Oh, random German tourist couple tell him that Canada is beautiful.Oh, and he goes on a hockey rink and kisses the Stanley Cup.When people think Canada is an uninhabited country, just one large forest with a micro-population that's just enough to man the Tim Hortons outlets at truck stops, can you blame them? It's a postcard, not a film. It was one Blackberry and a maple syrup donut away from being a total joke.It's fake depth. There was nothing deep about the man or his experience.If someone made a Swedish film about a man who travels Sweden, stops at an IKEA, listens to ABBA, stops somewhere for meatballs, everyone would laugh. But that's exactly what this film is.There's more to Canada than forests. It's sad that Canadians don't want to show the world the real Canada.This is a sorry excuse for a film. It's an Instagram feed, a series of Vines with a loose narrative and a weak soundtrack. Fake depth, shallow emotions, sepia filters, lens flare and photos of sunsets, desperate and needy, asking for likes, shares and retweets.

I've had cancer, in my 20s. This movie has never failed to move me to tears. It has never failed to capture the complexity of the decisions ( as a bollock cancer survivor). And it's Canada - one of the most gorgeous places in the world. And it's Josh Jackson, who does an amazing job. And.... Basically, this movie is a tear-jerker, but a good one. Or even a great one. From a more critical perspective, it's a rather slow movie that generally focuses more on video montages than plot, and whose characters are pretty 2D. At times you wonder if the Canadian tourist industry paid for it. Actually, I'm stuck at this point. It's still great. The voice-over can be cheezy, but works well. The characters are more than enough to tell the story. And all the leads do amazing jobs. And it really rings true, in so many ways.All told, you should really watch this. It's enjoyable. But also somehow taps into a load of feelings I hadn't realised I had.

This movie was complete crap. Tried way to hard to be artsy, a Wes Anderson rip-off. The pretentious narrator became annoying very quickly as well as the crap coffeehouse music. It really wasn't realistic or believable that the lead character had cancer. Halfway through the movie you begin to actually want Ben to die just so this awful movie would end. The ending was even more terrible when you realize the annoying narrator is Ben.(Who looks nothing like his younger counterpart) This movie would have been one hundred times better if they cut out all the terrible actors and made a five minute nature documentary on Canada. Horrible movie do not watch, I feel way dumber after watching this.