The Florida Project has a bravura finale that reverses this dynamic, suddenly sending the have-nots into the heart of the haves. The Florida Project focuses on a mother, Halley (Bria Vinaite), likely in her early twenties, and her daughter, Moonee (Brooklynn Prince), who’s 6 years old. Imagine how many people would have seen The Florida Project if it had gotten a Best Picture nom. Saw The Florida Project last night and loved it.
THE FLORIDA PROJECT focuses on a trio of young, largely unsupervised kids whose families live in cheap motels just minutes away from Walt Disney World, outside Orlando. Halley lives with her six year old daughter Moonee in a budget motel along one of the commercial strips catering to the Disney World tourist clientele outside Orlando, Florida. Halley, Moonee and Jancey hitch a ride (The Florida Project) The Florida Project doesn't exist in a vacuum – for Dawn Spencer, an extra in the movie, it's a bitter truth she lives every day.
I won’t give it away, except to note that Baker drastically shifts his camera technique for an exhilarating burst of cinema verite, one that also functions—at least for the comfortable, middle-class viewer—as a punch in the gut. Imagine how many more viewers would be tasked to feel for Halley… He said they had an agreement with an actress who he was about to name and upon realization that he was being recorded quickly said he wasn't going to mention the name. The two live together in a single room at a bright lavender motel in Orlando near Disney World. Sean Baker did a Q and A after the film and he was discussing casting the role of Haley. Halley, who survives largely on welfare, has little respect for people, especially those who cross her, it an attitude that she has passed down to Moonee, who curses and gives the finger like her mother.