Dear Frankie

Dear Frankie (2004) is a Scottish drama you can watch online on iFILM, directed by Shona Auerbach and starring Emily Mortimer and Gerard Butler. It marks Auerbach's feature debut, shot along the grey, windswept coastline of Scotland's west coast.

Lizzie has been moving with her nine-year-old deaf son Frankie from town to town for as long as he can remember. To keep him from the truth about his absent father, she has invented a sailor — writing letters to Frankie every few weeks in the man's name, describing his voyages aboard a ship called HMS Accra. When the actual vessel is scheduled to dock in their current town, Lizzie makes a desperate decision: she finds a stranger to play the role for a single day. Butler plays that stranger — not a romantic hero, but a quiet, slightly lost man who doesn't quite know what he's walked into. Frankie, meanwhile, turns out to be far more perceptive than his mother credits.

The film earns its emotion without pushing for it, which is the harder thing to do. Watch Dear Frankie (2004) online on iFILM.