What I remember most about Orlando is not being able to find a book store. This was decades ago. For all I know, now the Epcot Center is the southern Library of Congress. I suppose it doesn’t matter; the people in The Florida Project aren’t into books.
The Magic Castle motel is for two types of folks: suckers and transients. By the latter, I don’t mean “homeless,” necessarily, but instead people who truly are temporary guests. This hole isn’t meant to house folks with steady incomes. It took me until after the film was over to realize the titular word “Project” meant “Projects” as in slum housing. Who are the grubbiest of Disneyworld’s mythical inhabitants? Pre-ball Cinderella? The Seven Dwarves? The Lost Boys? None of them would consider The Magic Castle as residence. Heck, Sleeping Beauty would waken just to say, “uh uh. This ain’t happenin’. If I’m gonna sleep for all eternity, I at least need a two star motel.”
It’s likely that the children of the Magic Castle have never been to Disney World. It can’t be seen from the motel, probably by design, but if you hitch a ride down the freeway a bit, you can see the nightly fireworks show. You would think this would make the kids bitter or resentful, but that’s not the case. Six-year-old Moonee (Brooklynn Prince) finds pleasures in simpler forms, like bumming for ice cream money and hocking loogies on parked cars. Her mother Halley (Bria Vinaite) would be trailer-trash if only she could afford the trailer. The only thing she seems to be teaching Moonee is how to scam tourists.
Motel manager Bobby (Willem Dafoe) feels sorry for Halley and Moonee. But it’s more of a “there but for the grace of God, go I” kind of sorry. In a different kind of movie, he’d have made a dramatic gesture, either insisting Halley pack up and leave or find her a permanent spot somewhere. Bobby, however, is hardly a caricature; his priority is the motel which represents his home and employment, but past that it’s about understanding who shows up at the place. It’s not celebrities or a-listers; it’s the old woman who sunbathes topless to the delight of no one; it’s the John who made a big mistake; it’s the Brazilian couple who mistook “Magic Castle” for “Magic Kingdom.” And it’s Halley and Moonee, two females with almost nothing going for them, not even the rent. There is a magic within their own collective naivete: they don’t quite know enough to know their lives suck. They don’t even know enough to know that Bobby is looking out for them.
The Florida Project is mostly about happy-go-lucky Moonee, a kid allowed to be a kid. Like any screenplay child, she’s precocious, but it isn’t saving-the-world precocious, it’s the impish precocious of, “we’re not supposed to go in here, so I’m going in here.” It’s much more down-to-earth and accessible than those damn kids who are all, “at age 10, I learned vector calculus and saved the rain forest singlehandedly; and now at age 13, I’m burnt out.” It almost makes up for the fact that Florida Project has no plot.
We know this can’t end well. It can’t. The motel doesn’t allow permanent residents. Halley doesn’t
have a job. For all her charm, Moonee has the manners of a squirrel monkey which seems a tad odd as Halley has the manners of a baboon. Eventually, something has to give. And if you’re not in tears by the end of The Florida Project, I swear you have a heart of stone. No, I’m not going to back away or qualify that statement at all. Uh uh. This is the first film in ages which ended too soon for me. That isn’t necessarily a good thing; while, yes, I wanted more, the desire for more came as much from a need for closure as a need to see more of Moonee.
I missed the boat on Tangerine; I didn’t see the magic of the Sean Baker/Chris Bergoch tandem. I see it now and if you guys could ever figure out how to write and direct a plot, there might be awards in your future.
The teeny posse expectorating from
A second-floor balcony railing, umm
It makes their day
So who’s to say
There’s no magic in this kingdom
Rated R, 111 Minutes
Director: Sean Baker
Writer: Sean Baker, Chris Bergoch
Genre: The flipside of fantasy
Type of being most likely to enjoy this film: Parents
Type of being least likely to enjoy this film: Social workers
