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‘Mending the Line’ Comes to Netflix
A Brief Review of a Film About Fly-Fishing (and so much more)
Yesterday afternoon, I had other things to do, but I made the mistake of checking Netflix. It was my day off, so nothing urgent to do. Why not watch at least part of a movie while eating lunch? Well…
I was hooked.
Pun intended.
The movie that “hooked” me was Mending the Line, a drama starring Brian Cox, Patricia Heaton, Perry Mattfeld, and Sinqua Walls. Every member of the cast turns in a solid performance, especially Mattfeld and Walls.
Written by Stephen Camelio and directed by Joshua Caldwell, Mending the Line follows Marine combat veteran Colter (played by Walls) suffering from PTSD and wanting nothing more than to return to duty. He is befriended (grudgingly) by a crusty Vietnam War veteran named Ike (played by Cox) and a librarian named Lucy (played by Mattfeld) hoping to recover from her own traumatic loss.
The focus is on Ike and Colter as they work through their pain, guilt, and trauma through fly-fishing and a slow-building unlikely friendship.
The movie is a little slow at parts but packs a punch. It shows war’s psychological and lasting impact on our veterans, and the trauma so many never really recover from. And it…
