Independent cinema has long been enamored with the coming-of-age story. Especially for early career filmmakers, the rough road from adolescence to some semblance of adulthood offers the ultimate hero’s journey — mired in unexpected obstacles both external and within. There’s another reason so many first-time filmmakers choose this narrative path: they’re usually quite close to it themselves.
In her scrappy feature debut “Inbetween Girl,” writer/director Mei Makino shows small town America through the experience of a biracial Chinese American teenager as she navigates first love, sexuality, family upheaval, and artistic ambitions. With so many irons in the fire, “Inbetween Girl” bites off more than it can chew, and the amateur cast does it no favors, but it is
The saving grace of “Inbetween Girl” is its boisterous, sarcastic, and amiable protagonist, sixteen-year-old Angie Chen, who is brought to life by a naturalistic performance from newcomer Emma Galbraith.
In her scrappy feature debut “Inbetween Girl,” writer/director Mei Makino shows small town America through the experience of a biracial Chinese American teenager as she navigates first love, sexuality, family upheaval, and artistic ambitions. With so many irons in the fire, “Inbetween Girl” bites off more than it can chew, and the amateur cast does it no favors, but it is
The saving grace of “Inbetween Girl” is its boisterous, sarcastic, and amiable protagonist, sixteen-year-old Angie Chen, who is brought to life by a naturalistic performance from newcomer Emma Galbraith.
- 5/3/2022
- by Jude Dry
- Indiewire
Mei Makino's Inbetween Girl thrives at the crossroads of cultural identity, sexual exploration, and complex relationships - the recipe for a modern coming-of-age film. In her directorial debut, Makino explores life through the lens of high-school senior Angie Chen (played by Emma Galbraith), and to put it bluntly, Angie is going through it. Her parents are getting divorced, she's crushing on a boy who's out of reach, and she's confronted with racial insecurities otherwise left undisturbed.
Inbetween Girl stands in contrast to your traditional teen rom-coms, although the director did use many classic films for inspiration. Instead, Angie confronts the messiness of her senior year head on, and in a film that tackles heavy issues, Makino makes room for hope, growth, and humor. There's a comical relatability to Angie's awkwardness, her quick wit, and even her immaturity. Angie's endearing flawed nature makes her easy to root for. To explore her story even more,...
Inbetween Girl stands in contrast to your traditional teen rom-coms, although the director did use many classic films for inspiration. Instead, Angie confronts the messiness of her senior year head on, and in a film that tackles heavy issues, Makino makes room for hope, growth, and humor. There's a comical relatability to Angie's awkwardness, her quick wit, and even her immaturity. Angie's endearing flawed nature makes her easy to root for. To explore her story even more,...
- 3/31/2021
- by Karenna Meredith
- Popsugar.com
The 28th SXSW Film Festival revealed the Audience Award winners Tuesday, with Tom Petty, Somewhere You Feel Free, The Fallout and Not Going Quietly among the list of honorees. The news comes after the online edition of the fest announced its jury awards.
The Mary Wharton-directed docu Tom Petty, Somewhere You Feel Free chronicles the iconic musician’s work on his lauded 1994 record Wildflowers via newly discovered archived footage. The film won the Audience Award in the Headliners category, while The Fallout, Megan Park’s reflection on teen grief and trauma after a mass shooting — something all too familiar right now — won under the narrative feature competition banner. On the documentary competition banner, Nicholas Bruckman’s moving feature docu Not Going Quietly took the Audience Award.
Over the course of five days of SXSW Online, the SXSW Film Festival screened 75 features including 57 world premieres, three international premieres, four North American Premieres,...
The Mary Wharton-directed docu Tom Petty, Somewhere You Feel Free chronicles the iconic musician’s work on his lauded 1994 record Wildflowers via newly discovered archived footage. The film won the Audience Award in the Headliners category, while The Fallout, Megan Park’s reflection on teen grief and trauma after a mass shooting — something all too familiar right now — won under the narrative feature competition banner. On the documentary competition banner, Nicholas Bruckman’s moving feature docu Not Going Quietly took the Audience Award.
Over the course of five days of SXSW Online, the SXSW Film Festival screened 75 features including 57 world premieres, three international premieres, four North American Premieres,...
- 3/23/2021
- by Dino-Ray Ramos
- Deadline Film + TV
The documentary “Tom Petty, Somewhere You Feel Free” and Megan Park’s “The Fallout” won the audience awards from the 2021 SXSW Film Festival, it was announced Tuesday.
Mary Wharton’s “Tom Petty, Somewhere You Feel Free,” which tells the backstory behind the late rock star’s “Wildflowers” recording sessions, won among the three headlining films playing the festival. “The Fallout,” a teen drama starring Jenna Ortega and Maddie Ziegler, won the audience prize for narrative features after it also won the category’s jury prize.
“Not Going Quietly,” a documentary by Nicholas Bruckman about progressive political activist Ady Barkan and his fight with Als, won the audience award for films in the documentary feature competition. Director Natalie Morales also won the Narrative Spotlight audience award for her film “Language Lessons,” and Emily Kunstler and Sarah Kunstler won the Documentary Spotlight Audience Award for “Who We Are: A Chronicle of Racism in America.
Mary Wharton’s “Tom Petty, Somewhere You Feel Free,” which tells the backstory behind the late rock star’s “Wildflowers” recording sessions, won among the three headlining films playing the festival. “The Fallout,” a teen drama starring Jenna Ortega and Maddie Ziegler, won the audience prize for narrative features after it also won the category’s jury prize.
“Not Going Quietly,” a documentary by Nicholas Bruckman about progressive political activist Ady Barkan and his fight with Als, won the audience award for films in the documentary feature competition. Director Natalie Morales also won the Narrative Spotlight audience award for her film “Language Lessons,” and Emily Kunstler and Sarah Kunstler won the Documentary Spotlight Audience Award for “Who We Are: A Chronicle of Racism in America.
- 3/23/2021
- by Brian Welk
- The Wrap
Winners include Language Lessons, Who We Are: A Chronicle Of Racism In America.
Documentary Tom Petty, Somewhere You Feel Free and The Fallout and are among SXSW audience award winners announced across multiple sections on Tuesday (March 23).
Narrative feature competition winner The Fallout fared well when the juried award winners were unveiled last week. Megan Park’s follows a high-school student as she navigates life in the wake of a school tragedy.
Mary Wharton directed Headliners winner Tom Petty, Somewhere You Feel Free, which follows the legendary late performer as he records his second solo album ’Wildflowers’.
Nicholas Bruckman’s...
Documentary Tom Petty, Somewhere You Feel Free and The Fallout and are among SXSW audience award winners announced across multiple sections on Tuesday (March 23).
Narrative feature competition winner The Fallout fared well when the juried award winners were unveiled last week. Megan Park’s follows a high-school student as she navigates life in the wake of a school tragedy.
Mary Wharton directed Headliners winner Tom Petty, Somewhere You Feel Free, which follows the legendary late performer as he records his second solo album ’Wildflowers’.
Nicholas Bruckman’s...
- 3/23/2021
- by Jeremy Kay
- ScreenDaily
Winners include Language Lessons, Who We Are: A Chronicle Of Racism In America.
Documentary Tom Petty, Somewhere You Feel Free and The Fallout and are among SXSW audience award winners announced across multiple sections on Tuesday (March 23).
Narrative feature competition winner The Fallout fared well when the juried award winners were unveiled last week. Megan Park’s follows a high-school student as she navigates life in the wake of a school tragedy.
Mary Wharton directed Headliners winner Tom Petty, Somewhere You Feel Free, which follows the legendary late performer as he records his second solo album ’Wildflowers’.
Nicholas Bruckman’s...
Documentary Tom Petty, Somewhere You Feel Free and The Fallout and are among SXSW audience award winners announced across multiple sections on Tuesday (March 23).
Narrative feature competition winner The Fallout fared well when the juried award winners were unveiled last week. Megan Park’s follows a high-school student as she navigates life in the wake of a school tragedy.
Mary Wharton directed Headliners winner Tom Petty, Somewhere You Feel Free, which follows the legendary late performer as he records his second solo album ’Wildflowers’.
Nicholas Bruckman’s...
- 3/23/2021
- by Jeremy Kay
- ScreenDaily
In an SXSW littered with feature directorial debuts, the runway for new voices to emerge has never been wider. While the opportunity has been there, however, the results have been mixed, at best. So you’ll have to understand my excitement when I came across a coming-of-age drama centering an Asian-American teen who becomes sexually liberated in Galveston, Texas, amidst her parents’ messy divorce. Mei Makino’s directorial feature debut “Inbetween Girl” features breakout performances from its young cast, instructional life lessons for teenage girls, and heartwarming growth that never feels mawkish or put-on but organic and tangible.
Read More: The 100 Most Anticipated Films Of 2021
Angie Chen (Emma Galbraith), the focus of Makino’s brisk screenplay, is a sarcastic whip-smart artist attending an Episcopalian high school.
Continue reading ‘Inbetween Girl’: A Liberated, Clever Coming-of-Age Story [SXSW Review] at The Playlist.
Read More: The 100 Most Anticipated Films Of 2021
Angie Chen (Emma Galbraith), the focus of Makino’s brisk screenplay, is a sarcastic whip-smart artist attending an Episcopalian high school.
Continue reading ‘Inbetween Girl’: A Liberated, Clever Coming-of-Age Story [SXSW Review] at The Playlist.
- 3/22/2021
- by Robert Daniels
- The Playlist
Romcoms have long been a staple of the American high school fantasy, but what happens when high school is actually kind of… messy? Mei Makino’s debut feature “Inbetween Girl” presents a raw coming-of-age drama revolving around Angie Chen (Emma Galbraith), a bluntly unapologetic Chinese-Caucasian high school student. Her tough facade begins to falter, however, when things start to spin out of control. Her white mother seems inattentive at home; her Chinese father moves on to the dream Chinese American family; and her crush, school heartthrob Liam (William Magnuson), starts to whisper sweet-nothings in her ear while dating the school’s most popular girl, Sheryl (Emily Garrett). “Inbetween Girl” grapples with the growing pains of a soul-searching outsider pit in an existential maelstrom amid the picturesque East End of Galveston, Texas.
“Inbetween Girl” will play at SXSW, and perhaps no festival would have been a better fit for this Texas native.
“Inbetween Girl” will play at SXSW, and perhaps no festival would have been a better fit for this Texas native.
- 3/19/2021
- by Grace Han
- AsianMoviePulse
For her feature film debut, Mei Makino wanted to create a story that captured the flaws and imperfections of teenage life—particularly the confusion of having a multiracial identity. She initially sought to model her protagonist after the Black Latina students she taught in her Austin, Tex., youth film program, but when local actress Emma Galbraith auditioned, she rewrote the character as hapa—of half-Asian descent, like Makino and Galbraith both are.
The resultant Inbetween Girl (which will have its world premiere tomorrow as part of SXSW’s Visions section) is Angie Chen, a senior at an Episcopalian school on the Texas island ...
The resultant Inbetween Girl (which will have its world premiere tomorrow as part of SXSW’s Visions section) is Angie Chen, a senior at an Episcopalian school on the Texas island ...
- 3/17/2021
- The Hollywood Reporter - Film + TV
For her feature film debut, Mei Makino wanted to create a story that captured the flaws and imperfections of teenage life—particularly the confusion of having a multiracial identity. She initially sought to model her protagonist after the Black Latina students she taught in her Austin, Tex., youth film program, but when local actress Emma Galbraith auditioned, she rewrote the character as hapa—of half-Asian descent, like Makino and Galbraith both are.
The resultant Inbetween Girl (which will have its world premiere tomorrow as part of SXSW’s Visions section) is Angie Chen, a senior at an Episcopalian school on the Texas island ...
The resultant Inbetween Girl (which will have its world premiere tomorrow as part of SXSW’s Visions section) is Angie Chen, a senior at an Episcopalian school on the Texas island ...
- 3/17/2021
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
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