Review of The Florida Project (2017) by Didntloveit — 12 Nov 2017

Despite the exuberance of the children in the movie and the appealing character played by Willem Dafoe, I couldn't get past the aspects of the film that were off-putting, including the circumscribed setting, the abrasive the mother of the child at the center of the film (thank you to hobocrit for this word that perfectly captures her) and the feeling of dread as I anticipated what horrors awaiting both the unsupervised children and the mother who did not seek out sustainable ways of making a living.This movie is set in a large city, but because the camera stays focused on a short stretch of roadway, you never get a sense that the people in the film live in a major metropolitan area. While this circumscribed setting mirrors the constraints limiting the character's lives, it also limits how much the viewer can enjoy watching the movie. I wish we learned more about what other attempts the mother had made to find a job, given that her maternal instincts were strong enough to keep her from becoming drug addict despite her circumstances. It's like the filmmaker is telling us that it doesn't matter how she got into her current situation, and that something bad is going to happen to the kids, but of course it matters. Whenever you sensing bad outcomes lurking, because you know the characters are facing circumstances that commonly lead to the worst possible things happening, I think it is important to show why those things haven't happened yet to the characters.

I think it is important that we take seriously the precariousness of people's lives in our wealthy (by per capita measures) country. However, I think the abrasiveness stands in the way of us fully experiencing the humanity of mother and daughter. The daughter's joyousness is infectious, but at the end of the movie her fear seems forced to me.

See this movie to watch Willem DaFoe's heroic motel manager (although we never find out why despite living in this world, he manages to stay above the difficulties his tenants face and not become hardened by it) and the performances of the kids but be prepared to be frustrated by the limited amount we see of the physical environment and the lives of the characters.