Bon Cop, Bad Cop: Most Popular Homegrown movie in Canadian History!

Well, last week it became official. Bon Cop, Bad Cop became the all-time Canadian box office leader among films made in Canada (finally overtaking freakin' Porky's). It should be a proud moment for all Canadians. We finally made a truly entertaining movie! It's a shame that most people outside of Ontario/Quebec won't get to - or just won't - watch it. It really is their loss, because it's every bit as fun as any of the better mindless Hollywood blockbusters out there.

I'm gonna get a kick out of all the cultural analyzation that goes into how this film became popular by the Nationalists because I think for the most part it's not true. I definitely enjoyed it more being a proud Canadian cinephile who's always been rooting for Canadian cinema and who also "got" the cultural references in the film, but this film was great mostly because it was just a well-executed summer movie. I mean in reality it's not like it was all that different from say Rush Hour, just replace the black-chinese guys with the anglo-franco guys. The great scenes anyways (the autospy guy, the initial finding of the body and quibbling over who takes it, the bar fight, the house of weed fire & subsequent boss yelling scene, etc.) all have nothing intrinsically Canadian about them.

That's not to take anything away from it, personally to me, none of that stuff matters and it really shouldn't to a film that's main purpose is to be entertaining. We already have a long tradition of art films as it is, that isn't our problem, our problem has always been making films that ALL Canadians want to see. This film isn't the saviour of both art and mainstream Canadian cinema, but it is the saviour of the one that needs it the most: the mainstream side. I hope that it makes even bigger stars out of Colm Feore and Patrick Huard, who both deserve it. And I hope that this film marks the beginning of a whole new era of Canadians being able to see their own homegrown films in their local cineplexes instead of at tiny little arthouses. I look forward to the next time I can walk out of Silver City after watching another entertaining Canadian movie and be able to say "it was great, but it sure was no Bon Cop, Bad Cop."