Terrible acting, screenplay and direction.

One of my all time favorites.

Am I Missing Something?

Blistering performances.

This is the type of movie in which you won't regret watching it after the film is over, but you might think what else you could have done with your time and money if you spent any to see it.

The Song of Sway Lake directed by Ari Gold is a « don't miss » film. First, the scenery and the lake are stunning. The colors can be warm and bright. The lake is also wonderful because there is a lot of history going through the past and it looks like it's alive! If you turn the lights off you feel like being part of the movie and you totally forget where you really are. Good feeling! The actors, mainly Mary Peth Peil, Rory Culkin and Robert Sheehan are very talented. They are all different but also connected by a common point: a great nostalgia they all have but with different points of view. They are very interesting. The talent of these actors is great and allows us to love each character with his or her own personality.And then there's the music. It was written by Ethan Gold. It cradles you and goes perfectly with the film. I'd like to add that the film has already won an award at the Laughlin International Film Festival, another one for the Best Picture at Vancouver Golden Panda International Film Festival and a third one for winning the « Audience Award for Best Narrative Feature » at the Seneca Film Festival. Robert Sheehan has also won an award for the Best actor at Laughlin International Film Festival and Mary Beth Peil for the Best actress at Vancouver Golden Panda International Film Festival. It's well deserved because The Song of Sway Lake is superb! Congratulations to Ari Gold and to everybody who worked for the film!

Ari Gold (Adventures of Power) is a risk-taking art-making movie director. In a departure from his earlier work, The Song of Sway Lake is interested in human relationships, in the power of nostalgia and loss, and quite a bit more. It's a film that puts emotion before all else; and Gold, who also co-wrote the screenplay, realizes how places and objects, and especially music from the past can transport you and, like the central character, Ollie (Rory Culkin) can even get too strong a hold. Ollie returns to the lake house where his family has lived for generations and where his own father committed suicide some years earlier. He hopes to find an old record album that is a prized possession, which contains secrets and clues form his family's past, but is buried among the tons of albums and other collectibles stored in the vast house. Ari brings a friend along to keep him company, another lost soul named Nikolai, who seems to fit right into the property that sits on Sway Lake, like a hand in an old glove. It isn't until Ollie's grandmother Charlotte "Charlie" Sway shows up that things get very complicated. Ollie's is stuck in the past and this clashes with his present. it prevents him from growing up and from moving on with his life. Even during his stay in the increasingly busier lake house, he forms a romance with a local young lady, but his ability to connect always seems hampered by the weight of the past. The film itself almost feels like a gift from the past, it seems too overly earnest at moments and tapping into some vein that is dried out in these more cynical times. It's a movie that might have been made just around the time when Ronald Reagan came into office, the end of the innocence, as one singer song writer put it a while back. Youth is often difficult to leave behind as it is, let alone with you lose a parent and a way of life. When it's just snatched away from you. Some of this pain is palpable in Gold's movie. And you can hear it in the brilliant soundtrack composed by Ethan Gold, Ari's brother and collaborator.Finally, it would be a shame not to mention the that the film contains the great actor Elizabeth Pena's final performance on film. It's a hard thing not to feel that loss as well as you watch this singularly unique film.

Saw this film recently and found it mesmerizing! The scenery is spectacular , the acting by Rory Culkin, Robert Sheehan & Mary Beth Peil is superb and the music by Ethan Gold is very evocative of a bygone era! This film is currently on the festival circuit. See it if you can. Deserves a wide cinema release. Makes a change from all the action films. Beautifully observed work. The director Ari Gold deserves praise for the quality of the film. Simply stunning. No spoilers here but if you like to be entertained without loud music and like a genuinely heart- felt story you will love this! 10/10 Must See!