Runnin' Down a Dream
AFS hosts Katie Cokinos' I Dream Too Much
By Kahron Spearman, Fri., July 8, 2016
"Diane Ladd said something really funny – and I think it was at our South by Southwest screening in 2015 when we premiered it. She said, 'You're never too old to come of age,' which I thought was a really perfect thing to say," says writer/director Katie Cokinos.
An ideal vehicle for burgeoning lead Eden Brolin, Cokinos' I Dream Too Much makes Ladd's quote a germane sentiment, as "coming of age" becomes a relative experience for all.
Cokinos' inspiration for the film is autobiographical, fusing her own experiences into Brolin's daydreaming character Dora. "For me, coming out of college was one of the most stressful times of my life because I graduated from Texas A&M with a liberal arts degree, and I was supposed to be going to law school, but I decided I didn't want to," explains the auteur. "I really wanted to pursue film, but I was like, 'Oh my God, what does that mean?' It was a pretty stressful, if not the most stressful, time of my life.
"Especially when you have parental pressure, and I think societal pressure to, like Dora says to her mom, 'job, money, life.' Is that the order? I think a lot of kids are so quick to take that on. They don't really leave time to discover what they really want to do, and what's really going on, you know?"
Highly influenced by Joseph Campbell, Cokinos explains the film's schematic centering on the famed mythologist's ideas, specifically from the Bill Moyers-assisted PBS series (and subsequent book) The Power of Myth. "It is a hero's quest, but instead of getting on a plane and going to Brazil, she looks inward. It's an inward quest, which is helped by Aunt Vera and Abbey [Orange Is the New Black's Danielle Brooks] and Nikki [James McCaffrey] and in some ways her mom [Christina Rouner, playing Helen], too."
Almost interminably "in search of," Dora's quest for adventure leads her to travel to her irritable (but secretly awesome) Aunt Vera's stately home in upstate New York. Vera, played with nuance by Ladd, seems to be in the midst of her own transformation, set forth partly by Dora's questing, and also revelations from a romantic rival in her past.
Along the way, Dora meets Abbey, who has rock & roll dreams, and Nikki, a record producer in the midst of a midlife crisis. Readying a breakout, Brolin, daughter of actor Josh Brolin, shapes the film with an earnest effervescence and hope. The Academy Award-nominated Ladd fills Brolin's atmosphere with a steadiness and balance. The star of the film might be cinematographer Alex Rappoport, who manages to make upstate New York's winter landscapes bountiful and luminous.
Managing director for the Austin Film Society from 1990-95, Cokinos remembers a hopeful version of Austin, and its film roots deepening during her time in the capital city. "Austin's a boom-or-bust town. [It] just became another booming town, and the people that moved to Austin decided that they really valued films, and they liked having stars around. It just went into a whole other level." Austin's come of age, so to speak.
"I looked at I Dream Too Much as my love letter to kids that age, graduating college or just transitioning into adulthood. There's going to be plenty of time to have a mortgage and car payments. All that crap doesn't matter right now. What matters is discovering your own inner voice, your own inner excitement, you know?
"It's like, 'Don't worry about all that stuff yet.'"
The Austin Film Society will host Katie Cokinos' I Dream Too Much, Wed., July 13, 7:30pm, at AFS Cinema. There will be a post-screening discussion with Cokinos and executive producer Richard Linklater. For tickets and info, see www.austinfilm.org.
