Set in Orlando, Florida, the story follows single mother Halley (Bria Vinaite) and her young daughter Moonee (Brooklynn KImberly Prince) as they struggle to survive. They live week-to-week in a tacky tourist hotel gone to seed managed by the compassionate Bobby (Willem Dafoe), who tries to help the various misfits and rejects that occupy the place. Things are looking bad for Halley, though, as she's lost her stripper job and her options are looking more and more limited, while the often-unsupervised Moonee gets into all sorts of trouble.
I'm sure director Baker wants the audience to sympathize with these people living on the wretched edge only feet away from the tourist capital of the US, to think about the dichotomy of the overly-colorful, often grotesque architecture like something out of a child's dream serving as a backdrop for the struggles of the poor, and especially how it effects their kids. But often the film comes across as an illustration of how modern Western society has collapsed, and the only ones to truly blame are ourselves.
The misbehaving Moonee is not much of a surprise when her mother is such a car-wreck. Halley is her own worst enemy. Willem Dafoe has won many supporting actor awards already for this movie, and at first he seemed like a shoo-in for a long-deserved Oscar. However I can't really see why Dafoe was nominated. He's not bad at all, but there's nothing to his role that seems worthy of the acclaim.
I'm sure director Baker wants the audience to sympathize with these people living on the wretched edge only feet away from the tourist capital of the US, to think about the dichotomy of the overly-colorful, often grotesque architecture like something out of a child's dream serving as a backdrop for the struggles of the poor, and especially how it effects their kids. But often the film comes across as an illustration of how modern Western society has collapsed, and the only ones to truly blame are ourselves.
The misbehaving Moonee is not much of a surprise when her mother is such a car-wreck. Halley is her own worst enemy. Willem Dafoe has won many supporting actor awards already for this movie, and at first he seemed like a shoo-in for a long-deserved Oscar. However I can't really see why Dafoe was nominated. He's not bad at all, but there's nothing to his role that seems worthy of the acclaim.