The winner of the much-sought-after Sundance Grand Jury Prize and Sundance Director Award earlier this year, the poignant father and daughters drama “In The Summers” is finally coming out this fall. Music Box Films has set a release in September.
The directorial debut of Alessandra Lacorazza, known for a few shorts and writing and editorial work, “In The Summers,” is a touching and heartbreaking semi-autobiographical drama film that spans many years. The story is essentially about a wayward father who lives far away from his children following his divorce from his children. But his two daughters visit him in the summers at his home and New Mexico and have to navigate their love for him against his volatility and unpredictable behavior (read our review).
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The film stars René Pérez, known as the rapper Residente, Sasha Calle, known for her turn as Supergirl in “The Flash” and Lio Mehiel.
“I started developing [this story] a few years after my dad died, and it started in conversation with my sister when we were just trying to piece together our lives with my dad as we were visiting him in these chaotic ways in the summer. And the structure for it just came that way,” Lacorazza explained in a Sundance interview earlier this year. “I was like, I think this would be a really interesting way to examine a life, by just seeing these little snippets, of a father who has a lot of love but also has a lot of issues. Yes, it’s a highly personal story for me, but I think that with my cast, it also became something different and something beautiful.”
Here’s the official synopsis:
Siblings Violeta and Eva live with their mother, but every summer, they travel to New Mexico to spend time with their loving but unpredictable father in this moving drama that follows them from adolescence to adulthood.
Here’s the more expansive Sundance synopsis:
In The Summers follows sisters Violeta and Eva through their yearly summertime stays in Las Cruces, New Mexico, with their father. They share brilliant moments as Dad coaxes them to mountaintop sunrises and starry nights in deserts to teach them about the universe. Some of their other adventures are more disturbing; notably, things like a house party with Dad’s lechy friends and a perilous game of “no stopping” in his speeding car.
Music Box Films will release “In the Summers” in theaters on Friday, September 20. Watch the trailer below.