Guitar Lessons: Predictable Canuck Dramedy Aims High but Flounders

By Kim Hughes

Rating: C+

In the featherlight, Alberta-set dramedy Guitar Lessons, country singer-songwriter Corb Lund swaps a Stetson for a ballcap, and stars as grizzled, sexist, arrogant oilfield contractor Ray Mitchell, a solitary man who speaks in platitudes and who once had a career of some unspecified renown in music.

Newcomer Kaden Noskiye plays quietly determined 15-year-old Métis kid Leland Parenteau, whose recently deceased father, also a musician, bequeathed him a guitar and a heap of unanswered questions. In the small rural community of Paddle Prairie, everybody knows everybody. So, rootless Leland approaches cantankerous Ray, who he doesn’t know, asking him for guitar lessons.

True to his grizzled, arrogant, speaks-in-platitudes nature, Ray tersely brushes the kid off. But as the title of the film might suggest, guitar lessons — obvious stand-ins for big life lessons and all manner of spiritual healing —are in the offing eventually.

First, though, Leland needs to bust through Ray’s tough exterior to reach his tender side, which we know exists because Ray helps Leland when he’s injured and patiently tolerates the clownish antics of his sometimes-employee Ernie (Conway Kootenay), whose goofball exterior hides a painful secret.

Writer-director Aaron James’ film has a ton of heart and draws exceedingly committed performances from his cast, who are unfortunately playing characters underdrawn to a point where caricature seems like progress.

Not a lot happens in Guitar Lessons, and what does come — the slowly developing bond between Ray and Leland, Ray’s eventual softening after multiple brow-beatings by sharp women he denigrates, Leland’s burgeoning confidence — feels as worn as the blue jeans cladding its characters. The stupid escapades of Ernie, meanwhile, are just plain grating until an overly long scene of emotional reckoning in the final act.

As Ray and Leland gradually morph into a makeshift family, abetted by Ray’s (wait for it) long-suffering girlfriend Denise (Lianna Makuch), we know intuitively that comeuppance will unfurl all around, and redemption will be found on a fishing trip on a quiet lake at dusk, as Ray and Leland trade huge ideas cloaked in aw-shucks banalities.

So yes, Guitar Lessons is not very good. For the record, it’s no fun slamming a small, Canadian film made with verve that showcases Alberta’s natural beauty, exalted a bunch people in multiple communities (judging by the credits), and which doubtless overcame many obstacles to arrive on the big screen.

But it’s not much fun watching it, either.

Guitar Lessons. Written and directed by Aaron James. Starring Corb Lund, Kaden Noskiye, Conway Kootenay and Lianna Makuch. In theatres February 24.