Drying Up the Streets (1978) Reviews

• A father goes undercover to track down his own runaway daughter.

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  When I watched this movie on CBC as a teenager, it made two impressions on me: first, to never cause my parents hardship by running away from home; second, if I did run away, to try and meet Sarah Torgov(the actress who plays Ann, the prodigal daughter). Although the film offers fine support by such renown actors as August Schellenberg, Len Cariou and Jayne Eastwood, the two leads really stand out: Sarah Torgov and Don Francks. Francks plays Ann's dad, who takes on the seedy urban culture to try an locate his daughter. The father plays the low life to get the low down on his low-laying child. As the film evolves, the audience begins to realize that the father is not a stranger to life on the streets as he occasionally checks himself into re-hab clinics and seems all too familiar with the life of his new compatriots. We realize that this is not a story of a good father trying to find his daughter gone bad but a man who's own life has gone bad and is trying to prevent his girl from making the same wrong mistakes he made. The film has a strong emotional impact and teaches a valuable lesson without being preachy. I think CBC should re-air some of these 70's classics that put many USA TV movies to shame.

• The lowest cesspool of pimps and perverts, polluting our Canadian streets, makes for an unforgettable heavy drama

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  The first ten minutes of Drying Up The Streets is so frank, powerful and affecting, that it surpasses everything that follows, where we go deep into the mire of pimping and pornography, some of it, child related. We get to see a real ugly side of it in this. There are some scenes which are absolutely reprehensible. The electrifyingly powerful start is thanks to two actors, believably working their stuff, notably Francks of course, who starred in the original My Bloody Valentine. His portrayal of a drug addict, Pete, is too convincingly real, it's scary. Not for one blinding second, was I unconvinced. Francks had me. He's thrown an offer by a cop-old acquaintance, to go undercover and infiltrate these scum pornographers and drug dealers. In return the cop will tell Franck's, the locale of his long lost daughter. Francks already knows an old colleague, who can get him in. He strikes up a close friendship with a really young junkie hooker, (Sarah Torgov-equally convincing) who's just become part of this cosey stable. So Francks, does his magic, cooking up the heroin, with the others of course, never suspecting he's setting them up. Here's a frank Canadian in your face drama, the scene with Francks and Torgov, chilling out the park, over some chips, with shivery Torgov getting the sudden need for a fix was memorably affecting and convincing. The film has some pretty disturbing themes, as far the pornography side goes, and when a mother goes up against her pimp, refusing to take part in a kiddy flick, watch what happens. DUTS I'd say is for hard tastes, but be warned, it's a disturbing movie trip, but a highly recommended one. If not knowing of fine actor, Francks, check out some his other stuff.