Synopsis: On the surface Christina Stahl has the perfect life. She is an honor student. She is the captain of the track and field team. She has a full time job. To many she is your classic eighteen year old overachiever on the college bound track. But there is nothing typical about Christina's homelife. Her mother, Sheila Stahl, has an IQ of 59. Sheila can't read, drive, or handle money. Her father, Mike Stahl, was in a motorcycle accident when he was a teenager and suffered a brain injury. Despite the odds, the two adults met and fell in love. They wanted nothing more than to have a family and be like everyone else. Christina must now make the difficult choice whether to stay at home and continue to parent her "parents" or leave the household that she runs and go off to college. With a compassionate but unsentimental eye, this deeply unsettling and perceptive documentary by Matt Smukler confronts the viewer with painful moral questions through a very personal story.
Director's Bio: With a compelling interest to reach past the obvious and highlight deeper connections and small details, Matt Smukler delivers heartfelt films with universal resonance. His work is often championed for being authentically touching, due largely to subtle direction and naturalistic performances. His award-winning commercial for Iams, "Duck," which tells the tale of a boy’s lifelong bond with his dog, earned Matt a 2016 AICP nomination for Best Direction. His next feature film, after WILDFLOWER, is PRINCE OF LOST PLACES, based on the book by the same name.
- Year2020
- Runtime76 minutes
- LanguageEnglish
- CountryUnited States
- PremiereWorld Premiere
- DirectorMatt Smukler
- ScreenwriterMatt Smukler
- ProducerMatt Smukler, Brian Weidling, Shannon Riggs
- Executive ProducerMatt Tomach, Paige Goldberg Tolmach, Cindy Shortt
- CastChristina Stahl, Sheila Stahl, Mike Stahl
- CinematographerQuyen Tran
- EditorChris Callister
- ComposerDara Taylor
Synopsis: On the surface Christina Stahl has the perfect life. She is an honor student. She is the captain of the track and field team. She has a full time job. To many she is your classic eighteen year old overachiever on the college bound track. But there is nothing typical about Christina's homelife. Her mother, Sheila Stahl, has an IQ of 59. Sheila can't read, drive, or handle money. Her father, Mike Stahl, was in a motorcycle accident when he was a teenager and suffered a brain injury. Despite the odds, the two adults met and fell in love. They wanted nothing more than to have a family and be like everyone else. Christina must now make the difficult choice whether to stay at home and continue to parent her "parents" or leave the household that she runs and go off to college. With a compassionate but unsentimental eye, this deeply unsettling and perceptive documentary by Matt Smukler confronts the viewer with painful moral questions through a very personal story.
Director's Bio: With a compelling interest to reach past the obvious and highlight deeper connections and small details, Matt Smukler delivers heartfelt films with universal resonance. His work is often championed for being authentically touching, due largely to subtle direction and naturalistic performances. His award-winning commercial for Iams, "Duck," which tells the tale of a boy’s lifelong bond with his dog, earned Matt a 2016 AICP nomination for Best Direction. His next feature film, after WILDFLOWER, is PRINCE OF LOST PLACES, based on the book by the same name.
- Year2020
- Runtime76 minutes
- LanguageEnglish
- CountryUnited States
- PremiereWorld Premiere
- DirectorMatt Smukler
- ScreenwriterMatt Smukler
- ProducerMatt Smukler, Brian Weidling, Shannon Riggs
- Executive ProducerMatt Tomach, Paige Goldberg Tolmach, Cindy Shortt
- CastChristina Stahl, Sheila Stahl, Mike Stahl
- CinematographerQuyen Tran
- EditorChris Callister
- ComposerDara Taylor