The Florida Project
2017
**
Director: Sean Baker
Cast: Willem Dafoe, Brooklynn Prince, Bria Vinaite, Valeria Cotto, Christopher Rivera, Caleb Landry Jones
6-year-old Moonee and her young and feckless mom Hallee live in a cheap motel in Kissimmee, Florida. While the mother struggles to make ends meet, the daughter is left to her own devices. Set in the shadow of Walt Disney World, Sean Baker's plotless social realist drama delivers a brutally believable contrast of dreams and reality in modern day America. It's all good and well, but the problem is that Baker fails to evoke any empathy from me for Moonee and Hallee, who are some of the most irritating characters I have ever seen on screen. Willem Dafoe's performance as the motel manager is just about the only bright spot in the film.
