BAFTA, two-time Emmy and Tony, and an Olivier Award actor, writer, presenter and producer, Alan Cumming, is no stranger to queer audiences. He returns to star in Michael Clowater’s Drive Back Home as the louche Pearly, who is bailed out of a Toronto prison where he landed for the only kind of public indecency worth the risk by his estranged and cantankerous brother, Weldon, played by Charlie Creed-Miles (The Fifth Element, 1997 and Harry Brown, 2009). 

It’s 1970, it’s winter, and our siblings embark on a 1,000-mile road trip home to New Brunswick in a truck as shaky as their relationship, stalked by a family history of unspoken regrets and small-town porch-talk. 

Based on the actual events of his grandfather and great uncle, writer-director Clowater lets this hysterical and heart-warming narrative unfold at its own pace across the frozen Canadian landscape – an effort that earned the film 2024 Best Canadian Narrative Feature (Audience Choice Award) at the Calgary International Film Festival and play across the international film festival circuit. 

“There is an undeniable, gentle warmth to Michael Clowater’s Drive Back Home that defies the frozen Canadian winter backdrop.” – The Queer Review. 

“Four and a half stars. Michael Clowater has fashioned a film that is both a very Canadian film and a time capsule for the entire world at the time in its treatment of the gay community.”  – In the Seats. 

Viewer Advice: contains depictions of graphic homophobic violence, homophobia, family violence and an attempted suicide.