Nobody Waved Good-Bye (1964)

By Adam Thomas

Friday September 1, 2006

Directed by Don Owen A year after Larry Kent made Bitter Ash; the NFB produced this film, with similar themes, that’s since become a landmark in Canadian cinema. Convincing realism, with the characters improvising most of the dialogue, gives the film a rare sense of immediacy. Peter is an 18-year-old with a chip on his shoulder. Frustrated with the prospects of a shallow, monotonous adulthood, he thinks he knows it all. So he steals his dad’s car, gets busted, moves out, gets a job as a parking attendant, gets his girlfriend Julie pregnant, steals another car, and then leaves Julie on the side of the road in the rain. Equally powerful and convincing today as it was then, proving all you know is that you don’t know nothin’.