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Fisherman's Friends

Fisherman's Friends is a delightful movie and brought to mind Billy Elliot one of my very favorite ever. Of course in feel-good cinema which this is, the narrative arc takes out the rough edges of real life, adds a love story and some family drama to round things out. It leaves the viewer satisfied like after a good meal - all flavors and ingredients well balanced. 

Notwithstanding, it is a great story and wonderfully told. Watching it from my couch on cold fall evening, in these pandemic times where I haven't met people outside my immediate circle for over six months, it served the much needed escape into a world where being close to friends and strangers is mundane, everyday stuff. Maybe some day in the not too distant future, it may become possible to travel to a quaint village like Port Issac, enjoy the robust local culture and music. 

..the film is unrepentantly upbeat, even featuring some last-minute extremely happy storytelling to cap it off. It’s not very believable, and kind of twee, but that part really did happen.

Any movie that offers escape to a happy but realistic place should fare very well these days. We all want to see things turn out well in the end but in a way that we can believe it's possible for us too. The news cycle has been unrelenting in its spewing of bad, downbeat stories. A movie like this served as a much needed antidote to that. 

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