Pahokee

Filmmakers: Ivete Lucas, Patrick Bresnan
Trailer: Coming soon…
Runtime: 110 min

In a small agricultural town in the Florida Everglades, hopes for the future are concentrated on the youth. Four teens face heartbreak and celebrate in the rituals of an extraordinary senior year.

Ivete Lucas and Patrick Bresnan create a detailed and incredibly nuanced portrait of PAHOKEE, a small rural town located in the Florida Everglades. A community tightly knit together that struggles with financial insecurities and a bleak future. Through an extremely precise observational approach, the film manages to capture the daily life of the town with a great wealth of nuanced details. From sports events to school beauty contests, the filmmakers observe how, through social and collective rituals, the ideas of gender and identity are publicly displayed while creating new narratives. Moving past the crucial Wiseman lesson, which Lucas and Bresnan have fully absorbed, the film possesses the distinct feel of a Gil Scott Heron song, with its deep streak of rural blues tinged with urban echoes. A complex and multi-layered work that recalls also both the gritty social realism of the new American cinema as well as the neorealist touch. PAHOKEE is a powerful portrait of a forgotten America absent from the current political discourse.

– Giona A. Nazzaro 

About The Filmmakers

Ivete Lucas is a director, producer, and editor based in Austin, Texas. She was born in Brazil and grew up in Mexico. For the past 10 years, she has been making video art and co-directing observational documentaries with her partner patrick bresnan. Their latest short film Skip Day won the short film prize at the directors fortnight at cannes. The Rabbit Hunt, their previous film, won over 20 festival prizes and the Cinema Eye Honor. Pahokee is her first feature-length film and will premiere at Sundance.

Patrick Bresnan is a visual artist and filmmaker. He received his formal education working for notable mission school artists, Clare Rojas and Barry Mcgee (Twist). Patrick holds a masters degree in sustainability from the University of Texas School of Architecture. He is currently developing a new film in the Florida panhandle.