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  • Fly Away Movie Screening with Post Film Discussion with Award Winning Director
  • Fly Away Movie Screening with Post Film Discussion with Award Winning Director

Fly Away Movie Screening with Post Film Discussion with Award Winning Director

Item Number
144
Estimated Value
1000 USD
Opening Bid
250 USD

Item Description

Enjoy a movie screeing of the FLY AWAY in your home, with a discussion to follow with the esteemed and award winning director, Janet Grillo.
 
FLY AWAY is the complex portrayals of a single mother and her severely Autistic teenager daughter (Beth Broderick and Ashley Rickards, who does not actually have the disorder), in collaboration with a talented ensemble, were widely lauded by major critics, as “exceptional…remarkable…first rate…as natural as breathing…The actors are so exemplary it is hard to imagine this is not a documentary,” and “deserving of an Oscar Nomination.”  

Made as a SAG Ultra-Low Budget Independent film, and shot in 14 days, FLY AWAY premiered as 1 of 8 out of 2000 submissions in Dramatic Competition at the influential South by Southwest Film Festival (SXSW) in Austin, Texas, this March.  FLY AWAY opened immediately afterwards in April, in limited theatrical engagement, to rave reviews.
 
FLY AWAY tells the story of a single mother of a teenager with severe autism, confronting her child's adult future. What will sustain her daughter, as well as herself?
 
CRITICAL ACCLAIM FOR 
FLY AWAY
 
“Fly Away is a gripping, life-enhancing low-budget little film about the physically and emotionally punishing struggles of a single mother raising an autistic child. The actors are so exemplary that it is difficult to imagine this is not a documentary. They might not be household names, but they will be.... In a class by herself (Rickards), she deserves, at the very least, an Oscar nomination. Not since Patty Duke in The Miracle Worker has any actor portrayed a handicapped child (especially one with autism) with the same depth of passion and realism. Her emotional range seems to know no limits. She’s more heartbreaking than the movie itself, and that is very high praise indeed.”
 
  • THE NEW YORK OBSERVER By Rex Reed 
 
 
“The lovely, heartbreaking "Fly Away" benefits from superb performances and a gripping story managed with simplicity and grace by writer-producer-director Janet Grillo. As sensitive and affecting as this mother-daughter drama may be, the film skillfully bypasses its genre's potential pitfalls, opting for intimacy over sensationalism, poignancy over sentimentality…. But enough can't be said about Rickards, best known from TV's "One Tree Hill," who so convincingly embodies Mandy's wild child spontaneity, startling effusiveness and unwieldy physicality. She's remarkable — in a remarkably challenging role.”
 
- LA TIMES By Gary Goldstein
 
 
“Treading warily into territory that few dramas dare to explore, “Fly Away” is a defiantly unsentimental look at the complex codependency between a harried single mother and her severely autistic daughter… Taking a coolheaded approach to hot-button issues, “Fly Away” overcomes its neatly bow-tied ending with strong performances (including Greg Germann as a sensitive neighbor) and a spare, intelligent script. Ms. Grillo has no need of wordiness: Jeanne’s bruised body and exhausted face say it all.”
 
- NEW YORK TIMES By Jeannette Catsoulis
 
 
“The best thing a serious, no-nonsense movie can do is give us a glimpse into the world of someone whose experiences are so far away from our own that they are difficult for us to even imagine… Jeanne is multidimensional in a very real, down to earth sense…Broderick plays Jeanne with a lost look on her face. She is overwhelmed by her circumstances, but is determined to persevere. After many changes in key, when the symphony that is this film comes to a close, we see that Jeanne may be about to face her biggest challenge yet. An ending can be seen as a new beginning, and this film leaves me hoping for a sequel.” 
Sponsored
- HUFFINGTON POST By Joseph Smigelski