It’s one of those movies that reminds us that great drama and comedy can come from the most unexpected, ordinary places. We all have a place like Green Lake.
If Sunfish is a vacation, it’s the kind that’s less about escaping into a fantasy than about trying on a different reality: learning your way around the terrain, getting to know the locals, falling into their everyday rhythms.
The true revelation lies in the whole, in the gathering sense that life is full of change and that nothing ever really resolves itself. That might also be why this particular anthology works so well, and also why it lingers afterwards.
Falconer deftly captures the pain and worry present in such a conundrum. But through her beautiful ode to Green Lake, she reminds her audience and characters that it will be okay.
A collection of wistfully effervescent vignettes that resists the usual highs and lows of its format by drawing a gentle power from the stillness of the water that runs through it.
Falconer allows viewers a glimpse into the ordinary lives of richly developed characters in Sunfish. The filmmaker presents their stories in an understated and unhurried fashion, showing lives led against a bittersweet, end-of-summer landscape that is tinged with nostalgia.
Much like the setting it depicts, Sunfish (& Other Stories on Green Lake) is a quiet little gem with much more to it for people willing to take the time to look beneath the surface.
Sunfish is visually rich in the way that manifests when a filmmaker genuinely loves their subject or setting, and Falconer's Michigan roots are on full display throughout, and it left me truly excited to see what this young talent does next.