COAST blindsided me. I was not expecting a film that was going to hang with me and make me instantly email friends that they too should be covering the film.
The film is, nominally, about 16 year old Abby who falls for the singer of a rock band and has to decide if she is going to run out on her friends and family and go on tour with him or not. The reality is this is a film about a whole community of people who love each other and the path one of them takes toward finding herself and where she belongs.
This is a great film. Its that simple. This is just a great film.
I love that going into the film kind of blind I didn't know who the film was about. I love that the film opens with a sense of friends first before it focuses on Abby. Watching the opening minutes I kept discovering all of these great people who we might want to follow. What delighted me even more was the fact that the film maintains the sense of people and of family all the way through it. No one is two dimensional. No one is just background. Sure they might not get more than a line or a passing appearance but there is always a sense that there is a full person right there. When the film started I thought it was going to be a typical coming of age story and then all these other people showed up and I was forced to embrace them too.
What a glorious piece of filmmaking. So many filmmaker, including the Scorseses and the Spielbergs simply do not give us an entire film of people who all belong together and all seem like family- theirs and ours.
When the film ended I got misty. The ending was spot on. More importantly I found I was attached to the characters. I was so attached I wanted to go back in and do it all again. More importantly I just wanted to tell people about this wonderful film.
World Premiering at the Santa Barbara International Film Festival tonight, COAST is highly recommended
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