Ruth Lawrence

Directing

Ruth Lawrence

St. John's, Newfoundland, Canada

Ruth Lawrence is a filmmaker based in St. John’s, NL. Ruth’s feature films include Little Orphans (Best Canadian Feature, Whistler Film Festival 2020), Hopeless Romantic (2018), and the comedy feature, Party Pirate, sold-out its opening Gala overnight at the St. John’s International Women’s Film Festival in October 2023. Her documentaries A Lot of Love in the Room (2021) and Circus by Komatik (2019) have been featured on CBC Gem. She has directed, written, and/or produced on over 70 short films and webisodes. She’s writing two features, one with Sherry White and one with Emily Bridger. Ruth’s honours include the Joan Orenstein Best Actress Award, the RBC Michelle Jackson Award for Emerging Filmmaker, the Newfoundland and Labrador Arts Council’s Artist of the Year, the Queen’s Jubilee Medal, the YWCA Woman of Distinction, a WIFT-AT WAVE Award, the national Leslie Yeo Award for Volunteerism, and the inaugural Ross Leslie Award for her contributions to film and theatre.

Acting credits

Screamers: The Hunting poster
4.9

A group of humans arrive on Sirius 6-B to investigate an SOS signal sent out from the planet, which has been supposedly deserted since the destruction of the man-made weapons known as "screamers." Once the squad arrives, they find a group of human survivors eking out an existence in an old military outpost.

Screamers: The Hunting

2009

No artwork available
NR

A family affected by the opioid crisis struggles to stay together.

Opioid Scare

2019

The Untold Story poster
NR

The Untold Story of the Suffragists of Newfoundland (1999) is a docu-drama celebrating the thirty year struggle by the women of Newfoundland to win the right to vote.

The Untold Story

1999

No artwork available
NR

Dealing with trust issues triggered by a drug addiction, John must deal with the aftermath of his own actions.

Cracker Barrel

2012

Winners poster
NR

Didi and Max are the most competitive best friends in the fourth grade. But their friendship hangs in the balance when Principal Jack announces a school-wide contest to see who can sell the most fertilizer.

Winners

2012

No artwork available
NR

A hit man performs a morning job and an afternoon job then that evening he goes out on a blind date (on line date). Is this another hit or just a date?

Contracts

2010

No artwork available
NR

Surprise! is a dark comedy that satirizes the art world while taking a provocative look at the increasing problem of the misuse of sexual aid medication in elderly men with young wives.

Surprise!

2011

No artwork available
NR

A novelist becomes trapped in an elevator with two of her biggest critics.

Desperate Scribbles

2013

Behind the Wall poster
4.5

In this chilling, atmospheric thriller, Katelyn (Lindy Booth) seeks answers about the brutal murder that claimed her mother's life 20 years ago in the lighthouse where they lived, a crime for which her grief-and-guilt-crazed father has long held the blame. When developers descend on the abandoned lighthouse and begin to vanish mysteriously, Katelyn comes face-to-face with the evil haunts the family's former abode.

Behind the Wall

2008

Long Term Care poster
NR

A father and son duo, Charlie and Sam Pike, come to grips with admitting war-vet Charlie, who suffers from dementia, into a long-term care home.

Long Term Care

2015

Blueberries for Iris poster
NR

While out blueberry picking in rural Newfoundland, a young woman finds herself mysteriously lost in the company of a stranger.

Blueberries for Iris

2023

Body & Bones poster
4.0

Diminished by grief, 18-year-old Tess (Kelly Van Der Burg) is moving through her life like a ghost. The one thing that comforts her is listening to the music of Danny Sharpe (Joel Thomas Hynes), a local legend who left home almost 20 years ago. Tess is stunned when she wakes up one day to find him in her kitchen, igniting a spark of life in her that grows out of control.

Body & Bones

2019

Random Passage poster
NR

This award winning miniseries traces the difficult passage of young Mary Keane (Aoife McMahon) from servitude in Ireland to the squalor of rough-and-tumble Newfoundland in the early 1800s. Escaping attempted rape and abuse, Mary moves on with her infant daughter to find shelter at a remote fishing station run by Thomas Hutchings (Colm Meaney). In a time and place where life and death are a hair's breadth apart, Mary joins the community's struggle for survival against sickness and starvation. All of the Cape's people are fugitives of one kind or another, but by pulling together through hardships and tragedies, they forge a new life of hope - and even love.

Random Passage

2002

Anchor Zone poster
4.0

A graduate of an elite training school is determined to discover the identity of her lost father. She begins a dangerous journey, meeting an array of characters as she discovers her past. Stars Henry Czerny, Michael Luke.

Anchor Zone

1994

Incredible Violence poster
4.1

A hack filmmaker wastes the money lent to him by a mysterious organization, and so has to take matters into his own hands by locking a cast of actors in a house and becoming the villain in his own slasher movie.

Incredible Violence

2018

An Audience of Chairs poster
5.8

Maura Mackenzie believes the world is hers to conquer. With her career as a concert pianist gaining momentum, it seems her beauty and talent will be strong enough to mask the demons that threaten to engulf her. But with an absent husband and two young daughters at home, her precarious sanity begins to unravel until one summer day, burning with manic energy, she makes a terrible mistake — a mistake that will change her life forever. The consequences for Maura are catastrophic: her ambitious husband runs for his life, taking the children with him, leaving Maura to lapse into a full-scale breakdown. Life as she knew it is now over. With the help of her father, Ian, Maura works to reclaim her life and waits for a miracle to bring her daughters home. But when the fates align, can the past be forgiven?

An Audience of Chairs

2018

Everything Christmas poster
5.9

Christmas lover Lori Jo and her roommate head to Yuletide Springs for a longtime tradition to honor her late grandmother — and meet two men, Carl and Jason, along the way.

Everything Christmas

2023

Hunting Pignut poster
3.0

Bernice, a 15 year old misfit runs away from her rural Newfoundland community in search of Pignut, a tormented and violent gutter punk, after he steals her father's ashes right out of his urn.

Hunting Pignut

2017

Sweet Pickle poster
NR

After 30 years of salt beef and baloney, the instinctively vegan Isabel hops a bay bus to the city supermarket. But a nosy stock boy, a cashier with his laminated flip book of produce codes could wreak havoc with her newfound confidence.

Sweet Pickle

2009

No artwork available
NR

In discovering the secret past of an old St. John's neighborhood, a family learns that love can lead down an uncharted road that is best followed with the heart.

Cut from the Same Cloth

2009

Clipper Gold poster
NR

It's a fine, frail line between fantasy and reality when the doleful, downtrodden state of a couple's relationship unfurls against the backdrop of a feed of moose sausages and tea. Sexual frustration, co-dependency, domestic despair and just a hint of missing male libido all play out within the crestfallen subtleties of opposing table manners and passive aggressive tea-brewing rituals.

Clipper Gold

2014

No artwork available
NR

Alice, a bus tour guide in St. John's Newfoundland with a broken heart unexpectedly tells her tales of love and loss to a group of life-weary tourists and realizes the power of the moments she has experienced in the city.

The Tour

2015

No artwork available
NR

Fool Proof takes us on an international roller coaster ride as we explore the history and art of clowning. With professional clown Beni Malone as ringmaster, this one hour documentary is a visual feast which celebrates the rich history and recent renaissance of the most animated of performing arts. This journey comes full circle when Malone is joined on stage by his aerialist daughter, Anahareo. Fool Proof combines rare archival footage with fascinating real life stories, to create a springboard into the world phenomena of circus arts.

Fool Proof

2002

Four Sisters poster
NR

An old flame dredges up family secrets. Will four sisters finally put their jealousies and misconceptions to rest?

Four Sisters

2010

Behind the camera

Te Quiero poster
NR

A young man struggles to explain the cultural nuance of saying "I love you" in Spanish to his English-speaking lovers.

Te Quiero

2018

Snowstorm Roulette poster
NR

The biggest snowstorm of 1988 leaves Tom stranded in a tiny basement apartment with his worst nightmare.

Snowstorm Roulette

2017

No artwork available
NR

An incisive nuanced look at a family crumbling after their father returns from a war. Before the war showcases Tamara's love and understanding of the human heart.

Before the War

2014

No artwork available
NR

A woman looks past her insecurities in a time of change, self doubt and uncertainty.

Two Square Feet

2012

No artwork available
NR

A woman looks past her insecurities in a time of change, self doubt and uncertainty.

Two Square Feet

2012

Blueberries for Iris poster
NR

While out blueberry picking in rural Newfoundland, a young woman finds herself mysteriously lost in the company of a stranger.

Blueberries for Iris

2023

No artwork available
NR

The Cut of It is a unique exploration of the decisions real women made when they were diagnosed with cancer.

The Cut of It

2019

Hopeless Romantic poster
NR

Everyone has a different story to tell, especially when it comes to relationships. Lynda Boyd stars as Anna, a recently widowed cardiologist facing romantic challenges. While attending a wedding, Anna discovers she is not alone and bonds with six other women as they each share their unique stories of navigating the complex world of relationships. This anthology film weaves through the love lives of these women, charting their ups and downs in romance and rejection.

Hopeless Romantic

2018

Hopeless Romantic poster
NR

Everyone has a different story to tell, especially when it comes to relationships. Lynda Boyd stars as Anna, a recently widowed cardiologist facing romantic challenges. While attending a wedding, Anna discovers she is not alone and bonds with six other women as they each share their unique stories of navigating the complex world of relationships. This anthology film weaves through the love lives of these women, charting their ups and downs in romance and rejection.

Hopeless Romantic

2018

Party Pirate poster
NR

When Tommy is fired twice in the same week and finds out his brilliant best friend and lifeline, Costa, is leaving the country for a better job, he seizes an opportunity to prove his worth by taking his friends on a trip - in a stolen boat.

Party Pirate

2023

Blueberry Grunt poster
5.0

Vivian and Harold's camping trip reveals their tensions, leading to a life-or-death situation as they confront their past.

Blueberry Grunt

2025

Little Orphans poster
3.0

The wedding of their youngest sister, Janet, brings Gwen and Kay home to St. John’s, Newfoundland. While Janet struggles to hide her family’s dysfunction, Kay can’t help but create chaos wherever she goes and Gwen finds herself paralyzed by a past secret. The complicated web of relationships between the sisters, their Aunt Maureen, their absent mother, and Kay’s young daughter Billie, is only illuminated by the wedding. Gwen’s attempts to get Kay to take responsibility for her daughter highlights her own abandonment of her ex, Tom, leading them all to a not-so-perfect storm of a reception.

Little Orphans

2020

No artwork available
NR

When there's a knock on their apartment door Thanksgiving Day, Jay decides that today's not the day to introduce his girlfriend and common-law partner, Sam, to his Cameroonian parents.

Common Law

2019

Sweet Pickle poster
NR

After 30 years of salt beef and baloney, the instinctively vegan Isabel hops a bay bus to the city supermarket. But a nosy stock boy, a cashier with his laminated flip book of produce codes could wreak havoc with her newfound confidence.

Sweet Pickle

2009

Some Saturdays poster
NR

Hank and his wife, Jules, both in their 40s, set out for a leisurely summer boat ride. As they drift out into the harbor, we quickly realize that things between them are not as peaceful as we've been led to believe.

Some Saturdays

2018

No artwork available
NR

Alice, a bus tour guide in St. John's Newfoundland with a broken heart unexpectedly tells her tales of love and loss to a group of life-weary tourists and realizes the power of the moments she has experienced in the city.

The Tour

2015

No artwork available
NR

A tragic story of the death of a little girl, and the sister who thought she killed her.

Talus and Scree

2013

No artwork available
NR

A tragic story of the death of a little girl, and the sister who thought she killed her.

Talus and Scree

2013