Here's what's coming to CBC Gem in March 2021

Movies & TV, News & Features

What to watch on CBC Gem in March 2021

BY NOW Staff

February 27, 2021

Here’s everything new coming to CBC Gem in March 2021, including these highlights by NOW critics.

Hale County This Morning, This Evening

RaMell Ross’s Oscar-nominated experimental documentary about a group of friends living in Alabama’s Black Belt dispenses with traditional narrative in a search for the sublime. Shot over five years, the director uses associative editing to create a story out of sensory experience while emphasizing the landscapes and sounds of Hale County. Despite falling back on a few familiar visual tricks, the movie is most viscerally compelling when Ross’s probing camera evokes time through the natural flow and movements of his characters. March 26

The Communist’s Daughter

Here’s a novel idea for a web series: it’s the 80s, and a bright young teen is trying to make sense of the world around her (so: high school) while staying true to the belief structure in which she was raised: trusty ol’ Marxist-Leninist dogma! Sofia Banzhaf (Closet Monster, Splinters, Black Conflux) plays the lead, Jessica Holmes and Aaron Poole are her parents and George Stroumboulopoulos is in there somewhere too. Perhaps the oddest pitch for a comedy we’ve heard this year, but that just means we’re curious to see how it works. March 19

Mary Goes Round

Writer/director Molly McGlynn made her feature debut with this thoughtful 2018 drama about a Toronto addiction counsellor who’s forced to confront her own issues when she goes home to tend to a sick relative – and connect with the teenage half-sister she’s never met. It’s a very good movie, but it’s even more impressive in retrospect for McGlynn’s ability to spot tremendously talented actors: You’re The Worst’s Aya Cash (who would subsequently demonstrate amazing range in The Boys and Scare Me) is magnetic and complex as the troubled lead, while Degrassi’s Sara Waisglass – currently pulling focus as the chaotic Max in Netflix’s Ginny & Georgia – is just as watchable as Mary’s surprise sibling. Check it out. You won’t be disappointed. March 19

Broad Appeal (season 2)

Mary Walsh and Cathy Jones have been making comedy together and separately for four decades, very often in character as Mrs. Eulalia and Mrs. Enid – aging East Coast weirdoes who wander around complaining about everything in sight and occasionally dispensing some crabby wisdom. They got their own web series a while back, and now they’ve returned for a second season of touring the country and annoying passersby. It’s what Canada… needs? March 12

Room For Rent

Matthew Atkinson’s unapologetically ridiculous comedy – about a 32-year-old slacker convinced his parents’ new boarder is up to something weird and/or dangerous – is really just an excuse to watch two veteran scene-stealers try to steal a movie from each other. Mark Little, of Mr. D and Cavendish, is the slacker; Brett Gelman, of Netflix’s Love and the second season of Stranger Things, is the boarder, and half the fun of the movie is watching their radically different energies scrape up against each other. The other half is in watching the rest of the cast – including Mark McKinney and Stephnie Weir as Little’s oblivious parents, Suits’ Patrick J. Adams as his barely competent cop pal and Carla Gallo as a childhood friend who still sort of tolerates him – figure out what to do in any given scene with their co-stars. Give it a shot. March 12

The Slowest Show

Pat Kelly, creator of the audio delights This Is That and This Sounds Serious, goes visual with this experimental comedy series – about which very little has been released, other than a) it’s being billed as “Where’s Waldo come to life,” b) it’s shot in long, static takes and c) Andrew Phung, of Kim’s Convenience and Wynonna Earp, is on board in some capacity. Any two of those would have got us on board, honestly. March 26

The full list of new titles available on CBC Gem in March 2021 by date: