Of the six times I have been to Walt Disney World in Florida, it has always been via minivan. My motley family of five ceremoniously packs half of our wardrobe in overstuffed suitcases and triple checks the luggage to make sure all the necessary toiletries are present before basking in each other’s personalities for the two-day trip southward. When I tell most people that I’ve driven to Florida—six times no less—I am usually greeted with wide eyes and raised eyebrows. Most try to get me to admit that it must be mentally taxing to be in a car with family members for such a long time. However, I confess that I thoroughly enjoy the experience. The road trips I’ve had with my family are pre-vacations before our legitimately booked ones, amidst settings far from the ambiances conjured through Imagineer’s storyboards.
Of all the sights, sounds, and evocations I have been subject to on these travels, there has always been one area of our trip that my family collectively regards as ironic; that is the land radiating several miles from the epicenter of Disney World, where we drive through after deviating inland from the comfort of I-95. The most visited vacation spot in the world, which is comprised of four theme parks, two water parks, and twenty seven themed hotels, along with being a part of a corporation that makes $36,219,178.08 a day, is bookended by cities and towns that are rampant with poverty, abandoned buildings, homelessness, and lost dreams.
That’s why when I saw The Florida Project last week, I was familiar in the most distant sense of what was being represented on the big screen. The film follows 6-year-old Moonee over the course of one summer living her childhood mere miles outside the gates of Disney World. For the first third of the film, audiences observe Moonee in action playing with her peers, lapping at melting ice cream, and pondering deeply philosophical inquiries all while unaware of the penurious conditions surrounding and fueling her every interaction. The next third of the movie primarily follows Moonee’s mother Halley, a young, impulsive, vulgarity-spewing, twenty-three-year-old who ultimately resorts to degrading decisions in order to make enough money to reside in their hotel room. The third half of the film follows a more concrete narrative, which I would have enjoyed to see implemented earlier, exploring the ramifications of illegal activity in Florida’s dire landscape and the circumstances that prompt children to mentally escape encroaching law enforcement and the reality of neglect.
It is difficult to aptly describe the plot of The Florida Project without spoiling the eventual ending. In the spirit of Richard Linklater’s Boyhood, many scenes are slices of life, with seemingly little plot or action. Yet, it is in these moments that audiences question how monumental mundane happenings can be.
The final forty minutes of the film are what make The Florida Project a likely contender for the upcoming awards season. Brooklynn Prince was six years old when filming took place and gives a haunting performance which can span several emotions in seconds; she encompasses the whimsicality that Disney offers youngsters in one moment and then embodies the absolute isolation that children are subject to when betrayed by a parent. Bria Vinaite, who plays Moonee’s mother, applies no faux tattoos to her character’s physical appearance and conveys the grit and jadedness parents who had children when they were not yet adults possess. A pleasant surprise was Willem Dafoe, playing the hotel’s resilient and empathetic manager. Though seemingly composed, Dafoe’s Bobby is trying to make it through another day like all the hotel’s occupants.
Disney World plays a very subtle and indirect character (except for one very climactic scene which was filmed by director Sean Baker without the Walt Disney Company’s permission), yet it remains omnipresent from the opening to closing credits. Instead, audiences see Moonee’s face illuminated by Magic Kingdom’s fireworks and Halley expressing how difficult it is to get a job at the Grand Floridian Resort & Spa because of her piercings and permanent body art.
The Florida Project is not the first film to juxtapose Disney World’s gilded grandeur to the surrounding bleakness. (Lauren Greenfield’s remarkable documentary The Queen of Versailles proves how implausible it is to live as lavishly as Cinderella.) The Florida Project takes this notion a step further by dramatizing the events and focusing on the youth who live near a place where children travel from around the world to vacation. It is the seedy underbelly which has been uplifted, one that I have seen but was able to escape once driving through the gates to “The Happiest Place on Earth.”
I left the movie theatre with a pit of bittersweetness in my stomach. I cannot relate to Moonee or her conditions, but I can relate to the promise Disney offered me as a child; Mickey Mouse reaches out a hand, Cinderella invites you to breakfast, Aladdin lowers his magic carpet for you to hop on, and Main Street USA consumes every fiber of your body by being head over heels in love with life. By the end of The Florida Project, Moonee, like many children visiting Walt Disney World, has found her kingdom and is able to escape for a few ephemeral, fabricated, and magical moments.
–Salvatore Casto
The Junction Journal 