Grey Roads (2021)

Toronto filmmaker Jesse McCracken grew up in rural Ontario with two very different images of masculinity: one embodied by his father, a brash, hardworking and hard-living member of the motorcycle crew Redneck Riders; the other, his soft-spoken, community-oriented maternal grandfather. When his parents divorce and his mother leaves, Jesse returns to investigate his feelings of nostalgia for both his family and his hometown. The small town of Markdale has changed, no longer a thriving place but now a sleepy bedroom community for Toronto commuters. Jesse's own family, too, is undergoing a transition, one that Jesse's voice-over tries to make sense of. The question he poses-"What makes a good man?"-is answered very differently by both father and grandfather. Beautifully shot in black and white, this sensitive film debates what's lost and gained in this dual portrait of a changing family and town.