To fully understand John Carney’s latest comedy-musical, we have to visualize a time when a piece of music has changed us; be it the liberation of dancing in a club with your gorgeous friends, the catharsis of being handed the mic at a local hardcore show or the ceremonious tears that come when listening to Joni Mitchell’s Blue on the first brisk day of fall. In Flora and Son, these moments of transformation are neatly poised to form a catalog of growth for each of its characters. Thematically adjacent to Carney’s previous work in 2016’s loveable Sing Street, his latest release is a tender and hopeful embodiment of musical optimism.
Flora (Eve Hewson) is the strong-headed young mother and guiding force of the film who takes her admiration for musicians and turns it into a real passion for songwriting and producing. Advised by local law enforcement to get her son, Max (Orén Kinlan) involved in a hobby outside petty theft, she decides to fix up an old guitar to inspire her 14-year-old to make music to keep him out of trouble. Max, in teen boy fashion, is unimpressed and annoyed at his mother’s efforts to keep him busy with the tediousness of learning an instrument. The two begin in a major rift, but after going down a rabbit hole of beginner guitar tutorials, Flora is captivated by the idea of learning the guitar on her own. Jeff (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) Is the sometimes pretentious, sometimes genuine, LA-based instructor who is Flora’s chosen instructor for her weekly guitar lessons.
Admittedly, Flora’s path to becoming a musician begins as a ploy for male attention. Both to spite her ex-husband, and to impress her teacher, she struggles to shed the parts of her identity that revolve around men. Of course she isn’t at fault for believing her worth lies in the validation of men. Becoming a mother at 17 and raising her son has shifted her priorities to guiding him away from his teen years being spent at a juvenile detention center, and lessened her ability to take her own needs seriously. Her animosity toward Max’s father, Ian (Jack Reynor) is justified in his ability to pursue his music career, while she is forced to take her place in single motherhood. She’s angry, and rightfully so! But one of the defining aspects of Flora and Son is its need to understand female rage, and its answer to what exactly is the cause of it.
The film’s most distinct moments of character growth are paired with the original music and score as the conduit for each transformation. Flora is viscerally caught in the mourning of her adolescence, while watching a live recording of Joni Mitchell’s “Both Sides Now.” Max and his mother learn the tension between them comes from their shared anger while collaborating on their electronic-folk style music project. Jeff, a retired songwriter, is reminded of his passion for creating during a guitar lesson with Flora. All of these scenes paint a picture of growth, healing and simply the joy in making art.
Flora and Son takes on many musical undertones. It’s a wholesome mother-son duo featuring original Gen Z Irish rap, a romantic guitar ballad between two long distance strangers, and a tutorial on how to process the burdens that are imposed on us. It’s silly and playful, yet incredibly real; it invokes feelings of rivers to skate away on and life’s illusions and whatever other wisdom Joni Mitchell has imparted on us.
Photo courtesy of Apple Original Films
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