The latter stated, "... often more ambitious than accomplished. ... With everything up in the air, a viewer might be forgiven for finding this chain of ambiguities more pretentious than intriguing ... The plot's Twilight Zone-like entanglements might be more palatable if the film's execution were more adept. ... the acting ranges from mediocre to amateur. The character who hires Jack ... wears possibly the worst bald wig outside a joke store. In some close-ups, Vrana's untrimmed eyebrows threaten to engulf the screen. There's one particularly static scene in a hotel room where the camera operator seems to have crouched into the corner and fallen asleep. Perhaps he or she dreamed the whole thing." Melora Koepke of the Hour Community concluded, "While it's a good thing that there are film students to write papers about classic auteur films, it's a bit weird to watch a movie that feels more like the paper than the film. Which is how A Year in the Death of Jack Richards rings - more like an idea than an actual movie. [...] If puzzles and ambivalence are your bag, then A Year in the Death of Jack Richards is a godsend. Paquette is clearly just as concerned with muddling the edges of reality, blurring tenses in his storylines and inserting numerous homages to his cinema idols (Ingmar Bergman and Roman Polanski, probably) as he is with riveting his audience. Of course, if you have a film studies paper due, you're in luck. For others, A Year in the Death of Jack Richards is definitely a matter of taste." Awards and nominations 2004, Nomination for Best Canadian Feature Film at Cinéfest Sudbury International Film Festival 2005, Won the Best Independent Feature Award at the Festival of Fantastic Films (UK) 2005, Nomination for FIPRESCI Prize for Best First Feature Film at the Transylvania International Film Festival 2005, Won the Grand Jury Award at The DeadCENTER Film Festival 2005, Won the Richard Kind Award for Best Actor at the Trenton Film Festival for Vlasta Vrana References External links Category:2005 films Category:Canadian films Category:2000s psychological drama films Category:Canadian psychological drama films Category:English-language films Category:Films directed by B. P. Paquette