Winner of the Grand Jury Narrative Award at SxSW this year, I changed my schedule late at SxSW to ensure I was able to check out this movie later in the schedule before I left town. The screening of RAGING GRACE was on the second to last day of the festival in a packed screening at the Stateside Theatre with a LOT of interested attendees. The filmmakers were also in attendance and one of my highlights was seeing them passionately introduce the movie and remark how happy they were that their movie had the reaction that it did.
ABOUT: A bold coming-of-rage story. Joy is an undocumented Filipina immigrant who is struggling to do the best she can for her daughter when she secures the perfect job; taking care of an extremely wealthy but terminal old man. The new position pays well and guarantees a roof over their heads but very soon, Joy and her daughter Grace start to realize everything is not as it seems. Something is festering beneath the surface, threatening all they have worked for. Deeply personal, “Raging Grace” is a nightmarish fever dream from an exciting new voice.
Jason’s Reaction: Coming from absolutely nowhere, these filmmakers come rocking right out of the gate and also won the Grand Jury Narrative Award while they were at it! A mother gets a choice housekeeping job and the result is a man who we think is terminal but turns out is being drugged by his daughter. But is this all it is cracked up to be? RAGING GRACE comes from Filipino filmmakers Paris Zarcilla who has a promising sense of style, pacing and especially sound design and no doubt have a long future career ahead.
The movie was shot in a 4×3 aspect ratio which really adds to the tension. As Grace, actress Jaeden Paige Boadilla is a real find; her character is always messing things up at the start and causing havoc to her mom (also a terrific turn from Max Eigenmann), and while I have never seen anyone in the cast in a movie before their work really impressed. I am not sure what the future holds for this one but I am sure it will do well at festivals.
Special thanks to the Fons PR team for the invite to this screening. The movie should have a release later in the year.
This film and many others like it showed at South By Southwest this year from March 10-19. For more information on this and other titles, point your browser to www.sxsw.com!