Songcatcher (2000)
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74% of critics liked it
(88 reviews) -
73% of users liked it
(2,379 ratings)
Janet McTeer follows up her Oscar-nominated performance in Tumbleweeds (1999) with this period drama set during the 1910s. Dr. Lily Penleric (McTeer), an uptight musicologist, is furious after getting denied tenure again at an elite all-male East Coast university. She promptly quits out of protest,… More Janet McTeer follows up her Oscar-nominated performance in Tumbleweeds (1999) with this period drama set during the 1910s. Dr. Lily Penleric (McTeer), an uptight musicologist, is furious after getting denied tenure again at an elite all-male East Coast university. She promptly quits out of protest, and having nowhere else to go, she joins her sister in a remote mountain school. Her high-minded, refined ways quickly clash with the locals, yet her academic interests are peaked when she realizes that this bucolic mountain culture is thoroughly infused with music that harkens back to traditional English and Scottish folk ballads. After retrieving some tools, including a primitive recording device, from the East Coast, she sets out collecting songs. The locals react with a mixture of amusement, bafflement, and suspicion. Meanwhile, a mining company is strong-arming the impoverished residences into selling their coal-rich land for a pittance. Lily soon realizes that the culture she's seeking to preserve is quickly being torn asunder. Aidan Quinn and David Patrick Kelly also appear in this film, which was screened at the 2000 Sundance Film Festival. ~ Jonathan Crow, Rovi
- Directed By
- Maggie Greenwald
- Written By
- Maggie Greenwald
- Genres
- Drama, Romance, Musical & Performing Arts
PG-13,
- In Theaters
- Jun 29, 2001 Limited
- Studio
- Lions Gate
Critic Reviews
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Lisa Alspector, Chicago Reader
Like the main character, it's stodgy and didactic -- and full of grace and surprises.
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Dennis Harvey, Variety
Songcatcher unfolds at a leisurely but enjoyable pace, its dramatic contrivances never pushed too hard by director Maggie Greenwald.
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Rick Groen, Globe and Mail
No matter how purely sung, the music keeps getting lost in the melodrama.
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Roger Moore, Orlando Sentinel
A wonderfully crafted movie in a minor key.
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Edward Guthmann, San Francisco Chronicle
Tall, big-boned Janet McTeer ... is the ideal actress to play Lily Penleric.
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Cast
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Janet McTeer
as Dr Lily Penleric
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Aidan Quinn
as Tom Bledsoe
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Pat Carroll
as Viney Butler
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Jane Adams (II)
as Elna Penleric
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Gregory Russell Cook
as Fate Honeycutt
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Iris Dement
as Rose Gentry
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Stephanie Roth
as Alice Kincaid
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David Patrick Kelly
as Earl Giddens
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E. Katherine Kerr
as Harriet Tolliver
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Taj Mahal
as Dexter Speaks
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Muse Watson
as Parley Gentry
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Rhoda Griffis
as Clementine McFarland
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Hazel Dickens
as Singer at Barn Dance
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Emmy Rossum
as Deladis Slocumb
- Andrea Powell
- Danny Nelson
- Greg Cook
- Mike Harding
