Oh, Canada Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		3.5
Video		4.0
Audio		4.0
Extras		2.5
Overall		3.5

Oh, Canada Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Dr. Stephen Larson February 21, 2026

With Oh, Canada (2024), Paul Schrader has attempted to create a mosaic from the life of documentary filmmaker Leonard Fife, a fictional character invented by author Russell Banks whose novel Foregone is the basis for this film. Leo (played as an older adult by Richard Gere) is battling cancer and agrees to conduct an extended interview with Malcolm (Michael Imperioli), a documentarian and former student of Leo's. The elderly Leo agrees to hold the on-camera interview, which is situated with an Interrotron (a tribute to Schrader's friend, Errol Morris), only if his wife Emma Fife (Uma Thurman) is present. The narrative shuffles back and forth between the present day, 1958, the ‘60s, ‘90s, and 2000s. Leo tries to dispel the myths of his life and work as well as separate fact from fiction.

The movie flashes back to March 30, 1968 in Virginia where Leo (portrayed as a younger adult by Jacob Elordi) makes a fateful decision that will forever alter his family life and career. Married to his pregnant wife Alicia (Kristine Froseth), Leo is approached by his father-in-law Benjamin Chapman (Peter Hans Benson) and another family member on Alicia's side about running their family business. Leo is also offered a university teaching position so he tells the Chapmans he will mull over his options. Leo eventually departs for his hometown of Vermont where he visits his painter friend, Stanley Reinhart (Jake Weary), and wife, Gloria (also portrayed by Uma Thurman). Leo's personal life becomes rather messy with the affairs he has with various women, and while these are in the distant past, they are difficult to bear for Emma. As the narrative returns to the late '60s, the draft is still in full swing and Leo must make a decision if he wants to serve his country by fighting communists in Vietnam or get out of serving altogether. Or is Leo not a draft resister and not that concerned if he is in fact drafted? Schrader muddies the waters in his script. Cinematographer Andrew Wonder, a collaborator of Schrader's for two decades, shifts between B&W and color for the various time periods.

Preparing for the big interview.

Is the story of Leonard Fife worth telling? That is a question I asked myself while watching and re-watching Oh, Canada. Schrader shows how Leo became talented with a camera. He also shows the audience clips from Leo's documentary works. But Leo is just not that compelling as a character. This isn't a knock on Gere and Elordi's performances, but on the way the character is written. I understand that Schrader is painting him as a character of contradictions and demonstrating, through old age and illness, how memories are fragmentary and fleeting. Schrader also portrays Leo as an unreliable narrator who invents new memories. I get what the writer/director is after but he doesn't probe a critical question enough: If Leo did oppose the Vietnam War in the '60s, how and why did he reach that opposition? There's a scene where Leo, between ages 50 and 60, is teaching university students about the famous "Saigon Execution" photograph taken by Eddie Adams and quotes from Susan Sontag's book, On Photography, to illustrate some concepts. Oh, Canada needed more scenes of sociopolitical discussion for its 1960s section. The filmmaking is excellent, though. Schrader employs a Wellesian structure and even pays tribute to Kane's utterance of "Rosebud" with an ECU of his own. But as a whole, Oh, Canada, elliptical as it deliberately is, feels incomplete in its telling of a Canadian filmmaker and flawed man who Schrader wants us to regard as seminal and important.

Oh, Canada Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Kino Lorber's Blu-ray of Oh, Canada comes on an MPEG-4 AVC-encoded BD-50. Schrader has gone on record that the movie was shot in four aspect ratios. I observed 2.39:1, 1.37:1, 1.33:1, and 1.78:1. According to IndieWire, DP Andrew Wonder shot Oh, Canada in 4.6K ARRIRAW. In his commentary track, Schrader stated that he "thought" the picture was shot in 6K. Wonder shot the film using ALEXA 35 and ALEXA Mini LF Monochrome cameras. Wonder wrote in IndieWire that the whole film was recorded with G5733. He describes baking in a "nostalgic texture." If you examine the screen grabs I have retrieved for the scenes featuring Elordi as Fife, and watch them in motion, you'll notice a lot of fine grain. Writer Zoe Mutter interviewed Wonder for an article in British Cinematographer magazine where the DP discussed a lot of his aesthetic choices. Wonder compiled color-coordinated charts for how each section would look. (Wonder utilized Polycam and Previs Pro to pre-visualise scenes.) For instance, Wonder wanted the present day scenes filmed in both color and B&W to appear "mahogany, dark, and moody." (See Screenshot #s 1, 7-8, 17-20, 29.) For the opening scene (captured in #28), Wonder intentionally added film artifacts. For the flashback scenes, Wonder says he was inspired by the faded look Conrad L. Hall gave John Huston's Fat City (1972). Gordon Willis was another influence. For example, look at the low-key lighting Wonder generates with green shade billiard lights in screen capture #s 4, 12-13, and 24. Moreover, Wonder had Angenieux lenses built for Super 16 and Super 8 (frame grab #27) shots that he incorporated in the flashbacks. In addition, special color filtration (e.g, a red filter) was used for the 20th-century scenes.

There are two shots (#s 29-30) in which I observed some blooming in the upper right portions of the image. However, this effect may have been deliberate. Wonder was quoted on the True Lens Services website as saying that when using TLS Rehoused Zeiss B-Speed lenses, "The flares on the Wonder Speeds are a huge part of their signature. There's this bloom that happens..." If the transfer has a bit of blooming or a little banding, it isn't the fault of Kino's compression of the disc. The feature has received a very health encode as it delivers a mean video bitrate of 38961 kbps. My video score is 4.25/5.00.

Kino has provided ten chapter stops for the 94-minute film.

Oh, Canada Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Kino has supplied a DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 Surround mix (2284 kbps, 24-bit) and a DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 Stereo option (1558 kbps, 24-bit). Oh, Canada is a dialogue-heavy film and the 5.1 track is very front-oriented during the first half. There are occasional f/x and musical bits heard on the surrounds in the second half. One song has heavy bass that's punctuated along the .LFE channel. The ballads and score are written by Phosphorescent (aka Matthew Houck), who sings a lot like Bob Dylan. (Indeed, Houck has performed Dylan's "Like a Rolling Stone" and "Tomorrow Is a Long Time".) Houck also composed the underscore for Oh, Canada with the same airy quality that Peter Gabriel has given his film scores.

Optional regular English subtitles or English SDH are available for the feature. The SDH transcribe the lyrics from Houck's songs.

Oh, Canada Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Audio Commentary by Director Paul Schrader - in this feature-length track, the writer/director touches on his friendship with Russell Banks and adapting the novelist's 2021 book Foregone. Schrader explains why he titled the movie Oh, Canada. Moreover, he dives into how he found a structure for the film's mosaic, the color schemes for each section, and the locations. In addition, Schrader talks about the band Phosphorescent (and the lead Matthew Houck) as well as the songs. He also takes time to explain his use of the double narrator and "Bressonian narration." (The latter refers to the great French auteur Robert Bresson, who has had a profound influence on Schrader's filmography.) Schrader also goes into how he composed certain shots and used props, including his reaction to Uma Thurman donning a headband for one scene. The commentary is revealing as to how logistical challenges forced Schrader to adjust the shooting schedule for his actors and crew members. Schrader, whose had asthma since he was young, can be difficult to hear since his voice is raspier as ever, but somehow, I was able to discern virtually all his words. In English, not subtitled.

• OH, CANADA Behind-the-Scenes Featurette (3:31, 1080p) - an EPK program directed by Robert Levi. We hear from actors Uma Thurman, Michael Imperioli, Jacob Elordi, and Richard Gere. They talk about working with Schrader. Gere also discusses the Interrotron. While there's BTS footage of Schrader directing the actors, the filmmaker isn't interviewed here. In English, not subtitled.

• Deleted Scene - Epilogue (1:33, 1080p) - an unused epilogue to Oh, Canada. While it's a nice coda, I can see why Schrader chose to drop it from the final cut. Shown in 1.37:1. In English, not subtitled.

• Theatrical Trailer (2:08, 1080p) - an original trailer for Oh, Canada presented in 2.39:1 anamorphic widescreen (average bitrate: 25418 kbps) and accompanied by a DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 Surround mix (2348 kbps, 24-bit). In English, not subtitled.

Oh, Canada Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Schrader is a masterful filmmaker whose cinematic prowess is on display throughout Oh, Canada. But Schrader's script is rather lackluster. The movie isn't the full or rich experience that it could have been. Kino Lorber offers solid video and audio presentations. Schrader's audio commentary is a little hard to hear but worth at least a listen or two. I believe that Schrader is fine with having Oh, Canada only on Blu-ray. "2K is all you need to project in a theater," he points out in the commentary. RECOMMENDED to fans of Gere and Schrader. I also recommend that fans of ascending star Jacob Elordi pick this title up and add it to their collections.