'The Florida Project' review: Authentic drama one of the year's best movies

"The Florida Project" (Photo provided to MLive.com by A24)

By John Serba | jserba@mlive.com

“The Florida Project” plays out over a summer both carefree and troubled. It’s carefree for Moonee, a girl who I’d guess is about seven years old, and is very much enjoying a frequently unsupervised, and therefore exploratory and mildly delinquent summer. It’s troubled for her mother, Halley, who is rendered unemployable by others, and probably also herself, and tries to piece together money for food and shelter and a bag of weed.

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They live at the Magic Castle, a run-down Orlando motel so close to Disney World’s Magic Kingdom, you can hear the fireworks every night. A couple on their honeymoon pulls up one night, and the woman comes off like a spoiled princess because she’s at Magic Castle, $38 a night, not Magic Kingdom, probably $238 a night, at least. Moonee is there, observing: “I can always tell when adults are about to cry,” she says.

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Willem Dafoe and Brooklynn Prince in "The Florida Project." (Photo provided to MLive.com by A24)

Bobby is the motel manager. He fixes ice machines, sits at a computer, kindly but firmly shakes down occupants for what they owe. Many of them are bordering on permanent residency, despite rules stating otherwise; one gets the sense that these people could live cheaper somewhere else, but would be shut down by a credit application. The people are poor, and a charity truck giving away bread and jam regularly parks out front, but is asked to move around the back. Bobby often mediates conflicts, and even shuffles Halley and Moonee out of their room one night every month so they’re not violating policy.

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Bobby isn’t managing a motel as much as he’s managing humanity. If that seems impossible to administer, well, the movie doesn’t suggest otherwise. But that doesn’t mean there isn’t nobility in his compassionate attempts. Especially when a group of the residents’ children, typically and concerningly unsupervised, are approached by a suspicious man who could be harmless or could be a creep, but Bobby strongarms him off the property before we find out for sure.

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"The Florida Project" (Mark Schmidt | Photo provided to MLive.com by A24)

“The Florida Project” is one of those films that makes you feel like you’re eavesdropping on others’ lives. It’s raw and authentic, heartbreaking and funny, profoundly humane. It’s most affecting authenticity derives from its child actors, led by Brooklynn Prince, who plays Moonee. Christopher Rivera is her friend Scooty, and Valeria Cotto plays Jancey, who “lives” at another nearby fleabag, the Futureland Inn. They spend their afternoons roaming the nearby retail strip, ugly with chain restaurants and souvenir shops. They beg for change so they can share a soft-serve ice cream cone – “The doctor said we have asthma and we gotta have ice cream” is Scooty’s unconvincing con.

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The kids also play imaginatively, gamboling on picnic tables, hiding under Bobby’s desk, spitting on cars and mischievously shutting off the power to the facility. They know their share of cuss words. In a quietly melancholy scene, one of their friends is moving away, and there’s no room for his toys in an overstuffed car. The boy’s dad gives them away, promising new ones when they get to New Orleans. The other kids run off, laden with dinosaurs, balls, action figures, plastic guns. In the next scene, the toys are gone, and Scooty and Moonee play with a cigarette lighter adorned with a naked woman, which he either found or stole.

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Christopher Rivera, Brooklynn Prince and Valeria Cotto in "The Florida Project." (Mark Schmidt | Photo provided to MLive.com by A24)

I suspect the young actors were instructed to run free and be themselves, but I can’t be sure. Baker’s capturing of free-spirited childhood is strikingly realistic; often, moviegoers ask “How’d they do that?” about Hollywood special effects, but the stuff of Baker’s film is truly magical. Authenticity is a much holier grail. His work is often pragmatic, the cast frequently followed by handheld cameras. But that doesn’t mean the film is artless – a clearly scripted scene and gorgeously composed shot perches Moonee and Jancey in a majestic toppled tree with vines like feathery garland. “It’s my favorite tree because it tipped over, and it’s still growing,” Moonee says.

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That metaphor functions in a number of ways, but in its rough beauty I saw Halley. Played by Bria Vinaite in her first acting role, Halley is desperate, and likely depressed, coarse around the edges but unfailingly warm and loving to Moonee. The girl’s innocence is countered by a darkness – perhaps necessary, although the film never passes judgment – within her mother, who appears to have had Moonee while a teenager. They sneak into a neighboring hotel and enjoy a free hearty breakfast buffet as Moonee makes faces and says the darnedest things; they go out into an afternoon’s refreshing rain and sing and dance and play, enjoying a simple pleasure.

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Brooklynn Prince and Valeria Cotto in "The Florida Project." (Mark Schmidt | Photo provided to MLive.com by A24)

Willem Dafoe plays Bobby, and I mention it last because he’s the only recognizable face in the film, and shouldn’t distract from its dramatic power. It’s among the best work in his extraordinary career. Bobby smokes a cigarette on a balcony as dusk hits and the motel lights flicker on poetically, and we hear, but don’t see, the Disney fireworks popping in the background. Would you rather watch yet another glitzy fireworks display, or linger on a closeup of Dafoe, not speaking, but nonetheless deeply in character?

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By focusing intently on its microdramas, “The Florida Project” illustrates larger ideas about class struggle and corporatism, about hope and optimism, and elicits our empathy and concern over where these people, especially Halley and Moonee, will be next year, or even next week. Nearby, a village of garish condominiums sits empty and crumbling as the Magic Castle people squeeze themselves into tiny, dark rooms. It’s not right. When one of the condos burns, they cheer – the flames are fireworks for these struggling people, living in the shadow of the ears of the Mouse, king of the self-proclaimed happiest place on earth.

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Christopher Rivera, Brooklynn Prince and Valeria Cotto in "The Florida Project." (Mark Schmidt | Photo provided to MLive.com by A24)

FILM REVIEW

‘The Florida Project’

4 stars

MPAA rating: R for language throughout, disturbing behavior, sexual references and some drug material

Cast: Bria Vinaite, Brooklynn Prince, Willem Dafoe, Valeria Cotto

Director: Sean Baker

Run time: 111 minutes

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More photos from 'The Florida Project':

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Valeria Cotto and Brooklynn Prince in "The Florida Project." (Mark Schmidt | Photo provided to MLive.com by A24)

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Christopher Rivera and Brooklynn Prince in "The Florida Project." (Photo provided to MLive.com by A24)

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Willem Dafoe in "The Florida Project." (Photo provided to MLive.com by A24)

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