Review of The Florida Project (2017) by Mike P — 04 Dec 2017

So if this is one of the year's best... it's been a rough year for movies :/. I can appreciate the importance of showing characters like this on screen, but as a movie-going experience... it was frustrating.

I heard this was funny, and charming, and... it just wasn't any of that. Most of it felt like someone grabbed a camera and filmed the most annoying kids they could find for 90 minutes, without any direction.

Just them running around, doing worse and worse things, seemingly without consequence. A plot somewhat comes together in the 3rd act, and I finally start to invest in, and care about these characters.

Then suddenly, it ends. As someone in the theatre announced rather loudly, "what just happened?". And William Dafoe... he's fine. Yeah. Maybe more relatable, but... I still wanted more. I do appreciate hearing stories that are not like mine.

I think this captured a slice of unrepresented life well, and like life, there isn't always that clean ending, nor the character development and resolution I might hope for.