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“Blow the Man Down” is a delightfully dark, clever, and funny exploration of different kinds of sisterhood. Set in Easter Cove, a quaint fishing village in Maine, the pic sees sisters Priscilla (Sophie Lowe) and Mary Beth Connolly (Morgan Saylor) mourning the loss of their mother. The pair have little time to deal with that tragedy before another befalls them: a run-in with a dangerous man gets Mary Beth in hot water. She and Priscilla attempt to conceal her crime, but the pair quickly realize that they’ll need reinforcements, and seek the help of her mother’s longtime friends, finding themselves deeper and deeper in the underbelly of Easter Cove.
“We wanted to tell a story about the women we know in our own lives — our grandmothers, mothers, aunts, and sisters,” “Blow the Man Down’s” writer-directors Bridget Savage Cole and Danielle Krudy told us. “We tried to come up with ways to showcase the special power they wielded in our lives, a kind of feminine power. We also were excited about taking characters that are usually in the background and side roles in films and putting them at the center of our story,” they explained. “This tale is contemporary, but we hope to invite viewers to think about women of generations past, and all the untold stories that have unfolded by the sea.”
Cole and Krudy added, “We hope the film inspires viewers to look at their grandmothers, aunts, and sisters in a different light. What are they capable of? What secrets lie in their past? We hope viewers can look at their own female relatives as three-dimensional characters with a whole world of backstory and inner life outside of their familial role.”
Given how rare it is to see women over 60 on-screen, it’s a unique joy to see “Blow the Man Down’s” stellar supporting cast — Margo Martindale, June Squibb, Annette O’Toole, and Marceline Hugot — doing everything from baking pies to running a brothel. Beyond being three-dimensional, these characters make Easter Cove hard to say goodbye to. I’d gladly watch a series that centers on them.
“Blow the Man Down” is available to watch on Amazon Prime Video as of today, March 20.
