Richard Crouse

“North of Normal,” a new coming-of-age movie now playing in theatres, tells the unlikely, but true story of Cea Sunrise Person from her off-the-grid beginnings in the wilderness of Alberta and British Columbia to the runways of the fashion world.

Based on Person’s 2014 memoir, “North of Normal: A Memoir of My Wilderness Childhood, My Counterculture Family, and How I Survived Both,” the movie jumps in time between Cea’s upbringing in the flower power 1970s and her reunion, after a long break, with her free-spirited mother Michelle (Sarah Gadon) in the 1980s.

The story begins in Kootenay Plains, Alberta on a commune run by Micelle’s father “Papa Dick” (Robert Carlyle). Convinced that the “wilderness would solve all their problems,” the older man is a messianic figure firm in his rejection of the outside world. Michelle is 15 years-old- and pregnant with Cea, later played by River Price-Maenpaa as a child.

Cea’s (played as an adolescent and teen by Amanda Fix) life changes when Michelle, after an endless stream of boyfriends, moves them to the city to be with her latest beau. Thrown into a strange new world, Cea relies on Papa Dick’s philosophy—“Never give in to fear.”—and forges a new life, and security, for herself on the high fashion runways of New York and Paris.

“I’m not going to hang around and wait for the world to give me a good life,” she says. “I have a good face, and I’m going to use it.”

The long, strange trip of Person’s unconventional life is brought to life in a heartfelt, yet somewhat conventional film. Gadon embraces her character’s warmth, but also her unpredictability. Michelle isn’t a good mother, but she is Cea’s only support system, and their thorny bond is nicely wrought—warts and all.

“North of Normal” is a simple movie about a complicated relationship. It avoids most of the melodrama that could have flavored the story, although a hair cutting scene comes close, instead, choosing to allow the fine acting to reveal the hidden emotional scars of mother and daughter.