I’ve Heard the Mermaids Singing Movie Storyline. Polly Vandersma (Sheila McCarthy), an unsuccessful and somewhat talented photographer leads a solitary life in a Toronto apartment with her photos as the only décor and her bathroom-turned-darkroom as her one friend. She’s neither self-absorbed or bleak, instead content within the fantastic visions she experiences when her image emerges in the developer.
Her toothpaste factory job is a failure and she’s a lousy typist, but life takes a turn when she lands a part-time secretarial job in a downtown art gallery working for the French curator Gabrielle, a woman as elegant, self-composed and concerned with “important art” as Polly is awkward, unsophisticated and dumbfounded by “gallery art.” As a foil to Polly’s innocent joy in the minutiae of the ordinary world, the failed artist Gabrielle is desperate to create “just one truly beautiful thing” before she dies.
Polly’s first person narration in this 1987 low budget film, juxtaposed with the director’s view of her photographic antics, creates an insight into the odd world in which she’s fallen a la a very modern day public radio program examining one’s internal views and external outcomes. In the cross-hairs of Polly’s and Gabrielle’s lives, the film examines the ages old ideas of what is love and art? What is talent and worth?
I’ve Heard the Mermaids Singing is a 1987 Canadian comedy-drama film directed by Patricia Rozema and starring Sheila McCarthy, Paule Baillargeon, and Ann-Marie MacDonald. It was the first English-language Canadian feature film to win an award at the Cannes Film Festival.
Cannes Premiere
I’ve Heard the Mermaids Singing made its world premiere on May 10, 1987 at the Cannes Film Festival, as part of the Directors’ Fortnight program. At the conclusion of the screening, two thousand audience members gave the film a six-minute standing ovation. Four additional screenings of the film were added to the Cannes schedule, and all sold out.
The film almost wasn’t screened at Cannes. When Pierre-Henri Deleau, the programmer for the Directors’ Fortnight, received the film he mistakenly thought it was three hours long and would not preview it. A technician later discovered the film was less than 90 minutes, so Deleau watched it, liked what he saw, and invited Rozema to the festival.
Some distribution deals had been made prior to Cannes, but Rozema and Raffé had intentionally not sold the U.S. rights before the world premiere. After the film’s selection for Cannes was announced in Variety,[19] the producers received numerous calls from American distributors who wanted private previews, but those requests were turned down. Raffé said of that decision “We decided we wouldn’t screen it for anybody. You would see it in the theatre with a big audience, and we would either win big or lose big.”
Following the successful Cannes premiere, the producers negotiated the sale of American distribution rights. At least seven American companies vied for the rights, including Orion Classics, Spectrafilm, and the eventual winner of the bidding war Miramax, represented at Cannes by Harvey Weinstein and Mark Silverman. Weinstein initially offered US$100,000 for the U.S. rights, but Raffé and Rozema rejected that offer and several subsequent ones from Miramax until they finally settled on US$350,000, which was the biggest number the producers could think of, as it represented the film’s production budget.
By the end of the Cannes Film Festival, Rofekamp, Rozema and Raffé had negotiated sales to 32 countries including France, Germany, and the U.K. as well smaller countries such as Norway, Greece, Singapore, and South Africa. Rofekamp and the producers had earned advances on royalties worth $1.1 million, which made the film commercially successful before it was released.
I’ve Heard the Mermaids Singing (2022)
Directed by: Patricia Rozema
Starring: Sheila McCarthy, Paule Baillargeon, Ann-Marie MacDonald, Richard Monette, John Evans, Brenda Kamino, Patricia Rozema
Screenplay by: Patricia Rozema
Production Design by: Alexandra Raffe
Cinematography by: Douglas Koch
Film Editing by: Patricia Rozema
Art Direction by: Valanne Ridgeway
Makeup Department: Lyle Issett, Stephen Lynch
Music by: Mark Korven
MPAA Rating: R for brief strong language.
Distributed by: Norstar Releasing
Release Date: September 11, 1987 (United States), March 11, 2022 (United States – Re-release)
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