I've Heard the Mermaids Singing

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I've Heard the Mermaids Singing
DVD cover
Directed by	Patricia Rozema
Produced by	Patricia Rozema Don Haig Alexandra Raffe
Written by	Patricia Rozema
Starring	Sheila McCarthy Paule Baillargeon Ann-Marie MacDonald Richard Monette John Evans Brenda Kamino
Music by	Mark Korven
Cinematography	Douglas Koch
Editing by	Patricia Rozema
Distributed by	Buena Vista Home Video Miramax Films
Release date(s)	11 September 1987
Running time	81 mins
Country	Canada
Language	English language
IMDb profile

I've Heard the Mermaids Singing is a 1987 theatrical-release feature film, directed by Patricia Rozema.

The film stars Sheila McCarthy as Polly, a worker for a temporary secretarial agency. Polly serves as the narrator for the film, and there are frequent sequences portraying her whimsical fantasies. Polly lives alone, seems to have no friends and enjoys solitary bicycle rides to undertake her hobby of photography. Despite being somewhat clumsy, uneducated, socially awkward and inclined to take other's statements literally, all of which has led to scarce employment opportunities, Polly is placed as a secretary in a private art gallery owned by Gabrielle (Paule Baillargeon).

Ann-Marie MacDonald plays Mary, who is Gabrielle's former young lover, and also a painter. Mary returns after an absence, and she and Gabrielle rekindle their former relationship despite Gabrielle's misgivings that she is too old and Mary too young. Polly, who's fallen a little bit in love with Gabrielle, is inspired to submit some of her own photographs anonymously to the gallery. She is crushed when Gabrielle dismisses her photos out of hand and calls them "simple minded". Polly temporarily quits the gallery, and goes into a depression. She returns to the gallery, and revives a little when Mary notices one of her photos.

Mary and Gabrielle later visit Polly at her flat, and realize that the discarded photographs were by Polly. As the film ends, Gabrielle and Polly look at more of Polly's photographs and in a short fantasy sequence the three are transported together to an idyllic wooded glen.

[edit] Trivia

The title is taken from The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock by T.S. Eliot.

[edit] Further reading

• M. Alemany-Galway. A Postmodern Cinema: The Voice of the Other in Canadian Film (2002). Scarecrow Press.

• B. Austin-Smith. "Gender is irrelevant":" I've heard the mermaids singing" as women's cinema. Cross Cultures (2002). Rodopi.

[edit] External links

• I've Heard the Mermaids Singing at the Internet Movie Database