Sunshine State
Tags: storytelling

Plot synopsis:
As the primarily white town of Delrona Beach, Florida, is preparing for its annual festival, one of the parade floats is set afire. A young black boy named Terrell is found guilty of the deed, and he is sentenced to community service with a local community theater. An orphan, Terrell is in the care of an elderly relative, Eunice Stokes, who lives in the neighboring, primarily black community of Lincoln Beach.
Eunice is being visited by her actress daughter, Desiree, a former beauty queen who left town while she was still in high school. At the time, she caused a scandal because she was pregnant by her boyfriend and her parents sent her to live with an aunt in Georgia until the baby came. She has returned to make amends to her mother and also to introduce her new husband, Reggie. While in town, she becomes reacquainted with her old high-school paramour, Flash, who was a star football player and is now a promoter for a property development scheme.
Back in Delrona Beach, Marly Temple runs a motel and cafe owned by her elderly father and drama-instructor mother. Marly feels shackled by the arrangement and is tempted to sell the hotel to developers, but she assumes her father will never agree. Marly wanted to be a marine biologist and was once an underwater performer, but when her twin older brothers died in an accident, she reluctantly became her father's heir. Marly must also deal with her former husband, Steve, a slacker who is always looking to make some quick money. Marly additionally has a boyfriend, Scotty, who is struggling to become a golf pro and travel the tour circuit. Marly then becomes romantically involved with Jack, a landscape architect affiliated with the property developers.
Offering commentary on the story are a group of golfers, who act as an updated iteration of the Greek chorus.

Review: John Sayles is without a doubt one of the best writer/directors making films today and even though he doesn't get the backing and respect of Hollywood studio executives the actors in the business all know he's one of the best.
This is his latest attempt to draw our attention to the perils of overdevelopment in Florida by unscrupulous people who have nothing invested in the areas where they go to disrupt the lives of different communities, like the one presented in the film.
It would have been better to write about just a few of the characters rather than to try and write about the entire population of Florida.Production values were excellant.Most of the actors were good.Bottom line: Only go to see this movie if you don't have anything else planned..
Great cast includes Edie Falco  (The Sopranos), Angela Bassett, Timothy Hutton, James McDaniel, Alan  King and Mary Steenburgen.
"Sunshine State", like many other films that tackle the concept, offers a slice of life into the world of the people who inhabit a small town, which is, in this case, a beach front town in Northern Florida.Plantation Island is a picturesque small town.
Edie Falco plays a down-to-earth motel owner, Timothy Hutton plays a land developer, Angela Bassett plays a woman who has just returned to the island after having left when she was 15, and Bill Cobbs plays a retired doctor who doesn't like where the future of the town is going.
It lingers for long moments with minor characters we don't care about and cuts away from tense scenes just when things are getting good.It misses the mark.The worst flaw in the movie is that the two closest things to a protagonist, Edie Falco's Marly and Angela Bassett's Desiree, are straight-jacketed in characters that have no drive.
THE SUNSHINE STATE (2002) ***1/2  Edie Falco, Angela Bassett, Timothy Hutton, James McDaniel, Jane Alexander, Ralph Waite, Bill Cobbs, Gordon Clapp, Mary Steenburgen, Tom Wright, Mary Alice,  Richard Edson, Marc Blucas, Miguel Ferrer, Charlayne Woodard, Alan King, Alexander Lewis.
With SUNSHINE STATE, John Sayles has created a completely self indulgent film - writing, directing AND editing the project and (apparently) without the sense to know when enough is enough.
Mary Alice smiles as if she knows the secret to the universe (but won't tell us); Tim Hutton proves he should have done more films when he was younger (and cuter); Edie Falco stares numbly into space wondering why she isn't back in New Jersey making lasagna; Mary Steenburgen reprises her faded "southern belle" from MISS FIRECRACKER; Ralph Waite bellows like a beached King Lear; Charlayne Woodard is wasted in a tiny cameo.
At about two and a half hours, this movie seems to go on (and go nowhere) forever!Edie Falco, best known as the mother on the popular HBO series The Sopranos, plays Marly the apathetic motel operator who wishes for a better life.
Unfortunately, the same cannot be said for Angela Bassett who moves through the movie delivering her lines like a robot.The plot is essentially a web of about 10 semi-connected characters bouncing around with their own personal agendas.
That theory could also be supported by what seemed like some of the worst editing and overall film quality that I've seen in quite some time.In short, Sunshine State is a dull, dry, low-budget film with poorly written dialogue and weak acting.
This film features many very good, well known actors (Edie Falco, Gordon Clapp, Mary Steenburgen, just to name a few), and they all do a excellent jobs, given the overall weakness of the script.
But since these ideas are delivered in such a heavy-handed way, it's oddly like watching a pageant put on by a civics class at Beverly Hills High School.The story deals with a small town in Florida where real-estate developers are threatening to change the way of life.
This is a flowing, intriguing character study with a wry script delivered by a uniformly excellent and ego-free cast.There is little by way of drama here, just a snapshot of a beachtown community in which lives frequently change but whose heart stays the same.
Much like "Magnolia", but without the quick cuts and flashy editing, "Sunshine State" involves us in the intertwining story of as many as ten characters, each richly developed and well acted (Angela Bassettand Edie Falco are easy standouts).
This is a smart film for a smart audience, and stands among John Sayles' best works."Sunshine State" is a film rarity, and a complete pleasure.
"Sunshine State" peers into the lives of a clutter of characters who occupy a small Florida beach town at risk of a hostile takeover by land developers examining the local's reflections, ponderings, musings, and interactions in the onslaught of imminent change.
"Spend a lot of time worrying about a day coming, and when it does, it ain't so bad." - Furman Temple, SUNSHINE STATE, 2002So says Ralph Waite's character to daughter Edie Falco in just one of the poignant, sincere moments in John Sayle's SUNSHINE STATE.I have never been a fan of John Sayles, feeling that he uses quirkiness for filmmaking, but it seems that with each film he makes he gets closer to making the "masterpiece" that will be his crowning achievement.
This time I feel that he did it, with the warm and pleasant and strongly cast SUNSHINE STATE.My favorite film is NASHVILLE, and I saw many comparisons in that 1975 over-looked classic, from the eclectic cast (Edie Falco should be on a postage stamp, not once do you even think of Carmela), detached yet Babbit-like view of southern life, to the sly way that people weave through each others lives.
Sayles' SUNSHINE STATE updates Altman's vision of mankind by 25 years and still sees the same pains and jealousies that existed back then, but makes the film his own with his unique vision and luscious, deep texture..
I have very much enjoyed every Sayles movie I have seen and I am generally very fond of Altman-like ensemble movies (Nashville, Short Cuts, etc.)  so I was certainly expecting to enjoy Sunshine State.I found myself, however, slightly disappointed.
Superb performances particularly by Mary Alice, Edie Falco, Jane Alexander and Ralph Waite - and Mary Steenbergen and Timothy Hutton also very, very good.The story - the exploitation of nature for the sake of "progress", is wryly delivered, but contrasted with an adult treatment of racial themes in the magnificent tradition of masterpieces such as "Pinky", "Raisin in the Sun" and "Heat of the Night".Amelia Island, where I believe the movie was filmed, will paradoxically be deluged by travelers wanting to exploit it for themselves.
We see how the developers want to turn into a resort an area that was part of the state's African-American history, for instance.As it stands, Florida seems like a giant golf course already, what with Disneyworld and such things.
It's quite literally the Third World of the United States, despite the fact that elderly people like to retire there.Anyway, John Sayles has created another masterpiece, comparable to "Lone Star".
What I've figured out about Sayles is this:  he is essentially making melodramas, movie soap operas that are elevated above the daytime television trash by consistently strong acting, careful and well-planned interweaving of plot lines, and a sharp sense of atmosphere.Sunshine State is one of Sayles' most unabashedly melodramatic works, and, as a result, one of his strongest.
The parallel structure that Sayles employs is not new to him (he talked about both the Mexicans and the Texans, and their interrelationships, in Lone Star to similar effect) and he extends it here to tell the stories of two families, one white and one black.Marly Temple (Edie Falco) unhappily operates her family's Sea-Vue motel and greasy spoon seafood restaurant after her father Furman (Ralph Waite) loses his sight and falls ill (the mother, played by Jane Alexander, is a dotty community theatre doyenne and greyhound activist).
There are skeletons in each family's closet and the specter of segregation and racism hangs over it all, but now they face a common foe in the land developers.Sayles' greatest asset has always been his casts and his creation of characters for those casts, and Sunshine State is a foremost example of that strength.
Great character actors like Bill Cobbs, as the Lincoln Beach legend who leads anti-development protests, Mary Steenburgen, as the overeager planner of the town's Buccaneer Days, and Gordon Clapp as her suicidal husband, are all on the periphery of the story.
Love Sayles, and while in this film he creates some memorable characters--particularly Desiree and Marly--the fact is he wrote it a little too tight.
---but you have to pay attention.Edie Falco, Timothy Hutton, Angela Bassett, Mary Steenburgen, Jane Alexander, Ralph Waite, Alan King in a John Sayles film about Florida and development.
Unfortunately, for Sayles, only a handful of the characters are very interesting or developed (some story lines are just downright abandoned), resulting in what feels like a lot of wasted time.There are also several Fellini-esquire moments scattered throughout the film that substitute local Florida iconography (alligators, mermaids, pirates) for the religious imagery often utilized by the Italian master.
And then to add insult to injury, the overarching storyline (that thing that affects all the characters  like the earthquake in SHORT CUTS or the murder in GOSFORD PARK) involves the big bad developers (an easy villain) trying to buy up land in town to create shopping malls and luxury apartments, etc.
We come to know several inhabitants of the place and their struggle to survive and the threaten of a construction company that wants to turn the town into some kind of resort with golf fields and swimming pools.Sayles is a nice dialog writer and he's created some interesting characters, but his movie turns out to be a little bit long.
And in the other kind of movie he brings together a dozen or more characters in a single locale, and using more locations, like "City of Hope" and "Sunshine State".In this movie Sayles uses the fictional community of Delrona Beach, Florida to tell his story.
The threads of the plot include a compulsive gambler (Gordon Clapp) and his wife (Mary Steenbergen), A newlywed woman coming home to confront her past, the annual Buccaneer Days festival/celebration, and the efforts by a developer to buy out the residents in order to build a proper tourist trap (not just one that gears up once a year).As in all Sayles films, the characters drive the plot (not vice versa).
Workable, but partially uneven comedy-drama from the always reliable writer/director John Sayles that looks at two women (Edie Falco and Angela Bassett) who have separate agendas and deal with living in a small Florida community.
Despite that, "The Sunshine State" doesn't seem to have the usual feel that Sayles brings to his films ("Lone Star" and "City of Hope") yet the performances by Bassett, Falco, Mary Steenburgen, Alan King, and Timothy Hutton are worth watching here..
Maybe I'm a bit prejudice, the film was shot in North Florida where I live.(I'm always rooting for the home team.)That aside the movie is very moving and interesting when it stays with the main characters.
Miss Falco and Miss Bassett are very good in the film and the movie it at it's best when it stays focused on their stories.
This film features many very good, well known actors (Edie Falco, Gordan Clapp, Mary Steenburgen, just to name a few), and they all do excellent jobs, given the overall weakness of the script.
Every time it seems that as if writer-director John Sayles can't possibly come up with an premise even more brazenly non-commercial than his previous efforts--this is,after all,the guy who gave us adulterated lesbianism in "Lianna",striking coal miners in West Virginia in "Matewan",and impoverished Latin American villagers in "Men With Guns"--he manages to surprise us with a topic that won't interest anyone obsessed with goldmembers but will serve as nourishment to folks desiring some substance in their cimematic diet.In the sprawling manner of "City Of Hope"(one of his most underrated films),"Sunshine State" is a multi-character piece that takes a hard look at the people and politics surrounding a stretch of land in Florida.
The fictional Plantation Island is the setting,made up of modest beachfront communities that find themselves at risk of disappearing once developers show up with their eye on turning the valuable property into resorts for wealthy Northerners.Among those involved in the proceedings are a motel owner(Edie Falco) whose exhaustion makes it hard for her to decide whether to fight or sell;an amiable architect(Timothy Hutton) who ends up forming a bond with the motel owner;a failed actress(Angela Bassett)who left town when she was 15 and pregnant and is only now returning for a visit with her husband(James McDaniel of NYPD Blue) and has a confrontation with her mother;and a doctor(Bill Cobbs)who's outraged that the historical significiance of his African-American community will be wiped out forever once the bulldozers start tearing everything apart.
Sayles does not, however, go softly when it comes to the big-shot developers, headed by Alan King, who says, "We created this nature on a leash." They spin platitudes about Indians and nature while they play golf far from the effects of momentous decisions parents and children make about their homes, their environment, and their personal legacies.As Flash, a character caught in between the two worlds says, "There's a handful of people who run the whole deal, and the rest of us who do what they say and get paid for it."  Sayles has forsaken villains for social evolution of a sober and thoughtful kind..
Years ago,I caught my first John Sayles movie.It was "Matwan."  It was a riveting story about a coal miners strike in West Virginia in the early 1920s and it played to pretty small audiences, even for an art house film.
The story, reportedly shot on Amelia Island, Florida, is about the lives of numerous characters caught in a tug of war as two land development outfits try to move in on middle and lower middle class people trying to live their lives on an island off the Florida coast.And the great thing is, the developers are not completely bad, and some of the locals actually want to sell out, and as fast as possible.Edie Falco and Angela Bassett have the meatiest roles and both shine in them.
But this is a real ensemble piece, and Tim Hutton, Gordon Jump, Ralph Waite and a slew of others,including Alan King playing Alan King, do excellent work as well.This is a good Robert Altman movie about working class people with that special Sayles touch, meaning there are no cliches involved.
The movie is really more of a character study of the various people involved in the story, it really focused on their lives and thoughts.
Sayles, as usual, deals with ethnic values and heritage respectfully and also delves into many layers of Florida's past over a few hundred years or more towards the present all of which adds to the quilt work beneath this story.Watching this film is much like reading a book into which we get lost in our own concentration of fitting our own experience with that of the writer.This is the level that Sayles always delivers - in which the human experience of each character is displayed while being dragged along a path of the overarching envelope..
I viewed John Sayles' wonderfully fulfilling movie: Sunshine State yesterday here in Princeton.
They're good movies about serious and real issues but they follow the Hollywood tradition of good guys versus bad guys and deciding who wears the white hat or the black hat isn't difficult.Director/writer John Sayles has given us in "Sunshine State" a deceptively complex film, one worth watching several times.
The ending is a bit of a cop-out but not enough to be bothersome.The interwoven personal stories are interesting because they're very well-acted and are about people and problems we understand.Were I to teach courses in Property, Real Estate or Environmental Law I'd schedule a mandatory viewing of "Sunshine State" for the students.
At the end, both Marly and Desiree take full ownership of their own lives, and you can sense that their specific families and their community in general will be better as a result.When Sayles & Renzi made this new film, both were on the cusp of turning 50.
A wonderful enssamble cast created a great story set in the "Sunshine State" of Florida.
(I know likely a lie en toto, but probably an element of truth in some of the unraveling of those stories...)At first I thought Sayles intended to rally us against rapacious development, however in the film it seems that folks selling their land is an inescapable fact.And speaking of escape, the denizens of this fictional beach town (and its almost annexed neighbor) seem so bent on leaving the place, that it worked against the notion of preserving communities for me.
John Sayles, who wrote and directed "Sunshine State", has shown us how this dynamic works in his earlier movie, "Matewan." He does it here too.
He is a real treasure of independent film-making - and a pretty good actor himself.So, Sunshine State's virtues: a truly superb performance by Edie Falco, and a very fine one from Angela Bassett; a host of lovely supporting turns; really getting inside some of the issues explored, and showing us that it's rarely an open-and-shut case (Sayles rarely has unequivocally "bad" characters in his films, a notable exception being Kris Kristoffersson's character in Lone Star).
Sunshine State, the new film by writer/director John Sayles, contains a lot of elements that'll be familiar to his fans - a loose plot with over a dozen characters that inhabit a small community.
He's got a great scene with Falco where the two canoe around the swamps of the town; stuff like that, that dealt with relationships and not the land problems, are what make Sunshine State worth watching.