“Suncoast”

After watching nearly 50 films at the Sundance Film Festival this year, there’s little hope that I will remember “Suncoast” even a few months down the road. That’s not to say that writer / director Laura Chinn’s feature is bad, it’s just forgettable.

Set in Florida in the early 2000s, the semi-autobiographical film follows teenager Doris (Nico Parker) and her strong-willed mother Kristine (Laura Linney), a pair who are in the process of taking their brother and son who is suffering from brain cancer to an assisted living facility to die. It’s the same hospice center where the hot-button controversy Terri Schiavo (who was at the center of a political, legal, and media frenzy over the removal of her feeding tube) is also a patient, giving the mother and daughter another layer of stress added on top of an already somber moment. While spending time at the facility, Doris strikes up a friendship with a widowed activist named Paul (Woody Harrelson), who gives sage advice to the teenager between protests.

It’s a tough subject, and Chinn handles the themes with a poignant understanding. Her writing may be riddled with cliches, but what she does well, she does really well, especially when expressing the anticipatory grief that Doris and Kristine are so adept at ignoring. The women deal with it in their own way, and Chinn’s script stresses the importance of family at life’s most difficult times.

The characters are well-developed and the mother / daughter relationship feels very real, and despite a head-scratching and borderline uncomfortable relationship between Doris and Paul, the film features a nice supporting turn from Harrellson.

“Suncoast” is a forgettable family drama that is touching and sad, but its small-scale story and cast make up for most of its glaring flaws.

By: Louisa Moore