Stand!: and epic Canadian Heritage Moment with musical numbers

REVIEW by Drew Rowsome

Production photos courtesy of Manitoba Film & Music and Telefim Canada

18 Nov 2019

Opening during Oscar season and smack dab between the big-budgetted Frozen II and Cats, Stand! has the advantage of being a movie musical with heart. Set during the Winnipeg general strike of 1919, it becomes impossible not to root for Stand! in the same way that the film roots for the strikers. Stand! is an epic Canadian Heritage Minute with musical numbers and a Romeo and Juliet/West Side Story-esque love story slid in as an extra hook. Although the general strike was 100 years ago, Stand! couldn't be more timely in 2019, the year that wage inequality reached its peak.

Surprisingly the backdrop of the general strike becomes the most exciting through line. The climax of the film is truly horrific and shattering. There are multiple sub-plots carefully presenting an array of secondary characters - Lisa Bell as the exploited black maid, Gabriel Daniels as the Indigenous war veteran, Robin Ruel as the housewife discovering feminism and a social conscience, Tristan Carlucci as the crusading and betrayed Jewish journalist - and when they gather to march, in what is cleverly shot to look like a cast of thousands, one wants to cheer and put down the popcorn and grab a placard. The individuals are sketched schematically but the masses are inspiring.  

Director Robert Adetuyi, a musical veteran with Stomp the Yard and Bring It On: Worldwide #Cheersmack on his resumé, pulls out all the stops and combines Leni Riefenstahl with Winnipeg architecture for "Ultimatum." Paul Essiembre (The Normal Heart) as the villainous capitalist and Hayley Sales as Winnipeg's Emma Goldman face off in vocal battle for the hearts of another cleverly shot to look like a cast of thousands, and Stand! becomes a politically correct MGM '40s musical with sonic Sondheim nods. 

The music and lyrics by Danny Schur is tuneful but has a lack of orchestration. Lisa Bell's big number suffers the most as a voice that powerful should be riding a flotilla of strings instead of piano and electronic-sounding drums. To be fair, I was watching a screener and a theatre equipped with surroundsound may have a quite different effect. Stand! is a film version of the stage musical Strike! and the translation may just be slightly off: an ingenue with a big voice can sell a number in an intimate space but can appear caged in by the edges of a screen.

Marshall Williams of Glee and Laura Wiggins of Shameless, are the star crossed lovers. He's a Catholic, she's a Jew. They are both very pretty with Williams having an edge. The period costumes suit the former model and the scenes where he is shirtless or sweaty in a tank are riveting. We know there are sexual sparks because the camera tracks their eye movements, and because they sing about it in the lovely number "Love in a Place Like This" that is all exposition and clumsy metaphors. 

Wisely Stand! opens with a number by Gregg Henry as the hardworking alcoholic scab father. Henry is a veteran of the film and television world with hundreds of credits including The Love Boat, Slither, Falcon Crest, Gilmore Girls and seven episodes of Murder She Wrote. Though he is instantly recognizable as a familiar character actor, with the help of a beard and a wavering Bolshevik accent, he disappears and the character of Mike Sokolowski rips out our hearts in his big dilemma scene. He should have had another number, as should have Ryan Ash who, as the villainous returned soldier, does everything but twirl his moustache (actually only sexy George Michael scruff) and seems to be having the most fun of anyone in the film.

A musical, especially a musical on film, is a risky and ambitious endeavour. Stand! has ambition to burn and that it succeeds so well is remarkable. Songs in a musical express the inexpressible, emotions that are too oversized to be contained. With Stand! tackling worker's rights, the travails of the immigrant experience, interfaith romance, racism and greedy political corruption, it makes perfect sense for the characters to burst into song. And when Bell hits the upwardly anthemic modulation in "Stand" - "I'm going stand on the strength of the shoulders of those who stand up and never back down . . . I've drawn my line in the sand, and this is where I stand" - gritty Winnipeg labourers win out over animated princesses and pushy pussies.