Falling Angels movie storyline. 1969 in suburban small town Canada. Ex-military man Jim Field, married with three high school aged daughters, wants to portray having the perfect, loving family to the outside world, which is anything but reality largely based on his behavior and thus relationships with the other family members. While trying to be what he considers the model father, he cheats on his wife and is a bit of a blowhard.
A prime example of his behavior was several years earlier canceling a family vacation to Disneyland impromptu in favor of a two week nuclear attack simulation, taking the family to live during that time in the locked bomb shelter in their backyard. His wife Mary, a former dancer, suffers from chronic clinical depression, exacerbated by family events including her relationship with Jim. Regardless, Jim truly has a protective attitude toward her.
She spends most of her time in a semi-comatose state in front of the television while the girls help her self-medicate with alcohol. Each of the girls tries to deal with their family dysfunction in different ways. Norma, the Plain Jane self-conscious one who truly wants a loving relationship with her parents the most of the three, tries to hold the family together in maintaining the house while secretly harboring family memories which no one else in the family will talk about. Lou has always been the rebellious one, she most openly showing her anger toward her father, who she considers a tyrant.
Falling Angels is a 2003 independent film by Scott Smith, based on the novel of the same name by Barbara Gowdy and adapted for the screen by poet and author Esta Spalding. It is the second feature film by Scott Smith, writer, producer and director of Rollercoaster (1999). Set in the late 1960s, the film is a dark comedy focusing on the coming of age of three sisters and their struggle for independence in a dysfunctional family. It is also a story about the destructive effects of secrecy between parents and children.
Falling Angels (2003)
Directed by: Scott Smith
Starring: Callum Keith Rennie, Miranda Richardson, Katharine Isabelle, Kristin Adams, Monté Gagné, Mark McKinney, Melissa Brown, Courtney Goodison, Ingrid Nilson, Kristina Hughes
Screenplay by: Esta Spalding
Production Design by: Rob Gray
Cinematography by: Greg Middleton
Film Editing by: Reginald Harkema
Costume Design by: Brenda Shenher
Set Decoration by: Christina Kuhnigk
Art Direction by: Iain Reynolds
Music by: Ken Whiteley
Distributed by: Minds Eye Pictures, Triptych Media Inc.
Release Date: September 8, 2003
Views: 65
