I had an unexpected find at the local video store: a movie about my hometown. It was called Fairhaven (the Movie), as in Fairhaven, Massachusetts, where I spent the first part of my life.

Here is the indie movie’s synopsis: three 30-something friends from a coastal town are reunited because of a funeral. One of them is a former jock who plans to give up his job on a fishing boat to pursue writing. Another is a real estate agent who is divorced and has a daughter. The third is the bad-boy pal whose estranged father died. Oh, yeah, there are women like a new-ager who does laughter therapy classes, an ex-wife, and a coked-up lap dancer.

The jock keeps referring to an interview with Tom Brady, the Patriots’ star quarterback, who says in an interview after three Super Bowl wins, “There’s got to be something more than this.”

I could say the same thing about the movie. The pace was plodding. The characters were predictable although I liked Sam, the real estate agent. (The movie did fetch good reviews by the way.) 

For me the real star of this film was the well-photographed scenery. It was good to see familiar landmarks again. I didn’t even care they moved some of them into the town like the supermarket and the relic of the roller coaster at Lincoln Park. Fairhaven doesn’t usually get that much deep snow, even when I was a kid, but it made the old town look cold and dramatic.