A rascally grandfather and his straitlaced grandson drive cross-country into Canada to visit the family's ailing whisky distillery in William Scoular's well-meant but weightless dramedy.
Plus IconJessica Kiang
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Courtesy of Gatehouse Productions, Edinburgh Film Festival There is a pleasantly peppery performance from a bewhiskered — and bewhiskyed — Bruce Dern in William Scoular’s “Northbound,” but its spice is lost to the coziness of an approach that sets a higher premium on amiability than originality. Kicking off to Trooper’s stadium staple “Raise a Little Hell” and closing out with the plaintive piano-rock of Keane’s “Somewhere Only We Know,” in between, “Northbound” plots such a straight line from one mood to the other, from mildly irascible rebellion to melodic, melancholic wisdom, that its central road trip feels less like a late-life adventure and more like a familiar commute. But the time of its overly neat wrap-up, the only unanswered question here is why we needed so many large-print signposts for an emotional journey that never leaves the well-trafficked highway.
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