Having already suffered the humiliation of losing her job, Ren (Carmen Madonia), an aspiring writer, must now endure a week of summer vacation with her overbearing parents (Ramona Milano and Joey Parro) and extroverted, overachieving younger sister (Paige Evans). A 20-something trans woman eager to prove her self-sufficiency, Ren is instead forced to share a bed with her sister and wile away her time with resort activities intended for children or seniors. In the summer haze, it becomes increasingly difficult to distinguish between rebellion and regression.
With its intricate family dynamics, Luis de Filippis’ debut feature is disarmingly intimate and exceedingly well-observed. She empathetically illustrates how familiarity can breed cluelessness, leaving kin to rely on assumptions about one another rather than genuine understanding. The film’s deceptively rigorous structure sees each character transformed by week’s end, with Ren arriving at the realization that adulthood needn’t entail putting away all childish things.
Changemaker Award, TIFF 2022; Sebastiane Award, San Sebastian 2022
Q&A Oct 4 & Oct 6
Presented by
Media Partner
Carmen Madonia, Ramona Milano, Paige Evans, Joey Parro
Canada/Switzerland
2022
In English and Italian with English subtitles
Drug & Alcohol Abuse
Book Tickets
Missing VIFF? Check out what's playing at the VIFF Centre
Amrum
Twelve-year-old Nanning (Jasper Billerbeck) sets himself a mission to secure bread and honey for his mother to snap her out of her depression. It is 1945. The war is all but lost, and such luxuries are not easy to find on the remote island of Amrum...
Blue Heron
In the late 1990s, eight-year-old Sasha and her Hungarian immigrant family relocate to a new home on Vancouver Island. Their fresh start is interrupted by increasingly dangerous behaviour from Jeremy, the family’s oldest child.
Lou Reed's Metal Machine Music as Realized by Aram Bajakian, Stefan Maier and Anju Singh
Guitarist Aram Bajakian takes up the challenge issued to him by Lou Reed many years ago to perform the controversial noise album, Metal Machine Music. Plus Lou Reed performing Berlin from 2006.
Credits
Executive Producer
Michaela Pini, Kevin Chinoy, Francesca Silvestri, Jennifer Konowal
Producer
Luis De Filippis, Jessica Adams, Harry Cherniak, Michael Graf, Rhea Plangg
Screenwriter
Luis De Filippis
Cinematography
Norm Li
Editor
Noemi Prieswerk
Production Design
Matthew Bianchi
Original Music
Ella Van Der Woude
Director
Luis De Filippis
Luis De Filippis is a Canadian-Italian filmmaker whose work has played at festivals such as TIFF, Rotterdam, and Sundance, where her short film For Nonna Anna (2017) received a Special Jury Prize. De Filippis’ films explore the complexities of family, the bond between generations, and the realities of living as a trans woman. Her debut feature, Something You Said Last Night, is executive produced by The Florida Project’s Kevin Chinoy and Francesca Silvestri.