I'm not sure whether it's Canadians or US citizens who should be more annoyed with this film.
I knew when I saw this film being heavily pimped by The Movie Network, with zillions of showings (versus only a handful for Hollywood blockbusters and worthy Canadian films) that it was going to be bad Canadian content filler.
But they wore me down, and I caved in to watch it.
How sad is it that the best a bunch of Canadians (enabled in part by Canada and Ontario tax credits) can do is to make an embarrassingly bad movie about a foreign country's national tree?
As far as I know, the US has no "national tree" of the kind depicted in the film. It has a National _Christmas_ Tree (despite the claimed separation of church and state) in the Ellipse.
The near-100-year claim is nonsense in the film. For example, The National Christmas Tree was a new cut (dead) tree every year from 1954 until 1973. Only after that did they decide to return to planted (live) trees. But it wasn't easy. From 1973-1977 it was a Colorado blue spruce from Pennsylvania, which fared poorly. In 1977, it was replaced with one from Maryland that did even worse. In 1978, it was finally replaced with the current one again from Pennsylvania.
The actual "National Tree" of the US is Oak (note, not an actual individual tree, but an entire category of trees)
As for the film itself: * strong Canadian accents from many characters that even a Canadian would notice are out-of-place * awful special effects (I mean really, if they are this bad, why bother? Yes, I'm speaking to the people who did the falling cinders, and the internet video conferencing -- go find another line of work.) * typically cloyingly earnest characters * I'm not what you'd call pro-Mormon, but I felt that Mormons and Utah were portrayed needlessly unfairly in the film, like they were people from another planet, who didn't understand the National Christmas Tree. If this is actually true in some way, it should have been explained. * for a film featuring I-80, you'd think they'd include such road characteristics as the tunnels in Wyoming, the Archway Monument in Nebraska, the bridge over the Mississippi River, the toll road in Indiana and Ohio, and the varying flat, hilly, canyon, and mountainous landscapes from state to state. Filmmakers obviously ignored the superior example set by the 2008 Canadian road movie, One Week.
Who had the bright idea to shoot a road movie almost entirely in close-up? But even then, they still can't hide the Canadian-ness of the surroundings. Lime Ridge Mall (you know, with the Canadian Shoppers Drug Mart that you can see in the film) is in Hamilton, Ontario, not Chicago. And I somehow doubt that the Amish in Pennsylvania frequently fly the Canadian flag, and certainly not by itself.
For some reason, Maryland (between Pennsylvania and DC) wasn't worth mentioning. They just drive directly from Pennsylvania to DC.
I also didn't like the woman. She reminded me of the alien leader in the recent V mini-series. And if you take a job that requires significant travel separating you from your significant other, then you are not the person in the relationship who gets to complain when you can't get in touch on your schedule. That right belongs to person who stays at home. This woman has a heart of ice.
Last, the young man and woman are shown drinking wine. Like many of the states they travelled through (Idaho, Indiana, Pennsylvania, and Maryland) the District of Columbia has a total ban on consumption of alcohol by people under 21, even in private with parental permission.
So, no, I didn't like it. Why is this junk cluttering the subscriber movie channels in Canada, when we get just one or two chances to see quality films that we actually want to see?
