Sightlines · reception

How The Company of Strangers was received

1990 · Cynthia Scott · The Company of Strangers on Sightlines

The arc

A festival darling in 1990 — Best Canadian Film at Vancouver, a Genie Best Picture nomination — it then quietly slipped out of circulation for decades, and has since been rediscovered as a word-of-mouth treasure among fans of gentle, humane cinema.

What’s debated

The perennial fan refrain is less a debate than a grievance — 'why does nobody know this film?' — along with friendly squabbling over whether it should be shelved as documentary or fiction, since its cast of non-professional women largely play versions of themselves.

Its footprint

It's become a quiet touchstone in conversations about how rarely cinema puts women in their 70s and 80s at the center of the frame — the film people reach for as proof it can be done, beautifully.

Where it stands

A beloved-but-under-seen hidden gem: one of those quietly high-rated Letterboxd discoveries that cinephiles press on each other like a secret.

Did you know? It was retitled 'Strangers in Good Company' for its US release to avoid confusion with another 1990 film, Paul Schrader's The Comfort of Strangers — and its director, Cynthia Scott, had already won an Oscar for the NFB documentary short Flamenco at 5:15.