Film, Art and Life Blends Together in “The Midway Point”

The famous quote “Art imitates life” has never been more meaningful to what happens in the feature film “The Midway Point”.

Written and directed by the young Brazilian Lucca Vieira, the movie shows the life and the struggles of the introverted high-school junior Jake (Sean Ryan Fox) who suffers from depression and anxiety and has a hard time when it comes to social relationships. His approach to social life starts to change when, after having a panic attack during a school test, he leaves the room for a break and meets the outgoing senior student Alice (Catharine Daddario), who becomes his main inspiration. Jake and Alice start to have a relationship that bonds them together in a way that they never experienced before. As the relationship develops, he discovers Alice’s world and her inner and family conflicts, making him understand that he’s not the only person who lives in a lonely introverted world.

Jake’s inner thoughts and obstacles show a whole world that so many people can relate to but the plot is not a coincidence. Art and life blend together and it’s not difficult to see how self-biographical the story is when looking at Lucca’s life. “…I was struggling socially. Having been diagnosed with Asperger’s syndrome at the age of 12, I was always surrounded with the notion that I was different. I could never deeply connect with my peers, afraid of being seen as awkward. I was seeing friends starting romantic relationships and hosting parties, while I was stuck in my bedroom”, says the director. He continues, “One morning, during my junior year of high school, I was riding to school in a depressive haze, earphones plugged, when I suddenly pictured a scene from a film with this exact concept. I instantly thought to myself: ‘I could make something really special out of this!’.” The opening scene of “The Midway Point” couldn’t be any different.

Featuring important names like Wes Studi (“The Last of the Mohicans”, “Avatar”, Oscar 2019), Julie Benz (“Rambo”, “Dexter”) and Thora Birch (“American Beauty”, “The Walking Dead”), “The Midway Point” is a thought-provoking and emotional drama full of light moments that bring the attention to problems that are more common than most people can think. Isolation, social aversion and difficulty in facing daily challenges are themes that can be approached in inspirational ways to help people to find “the light at the end of the tunnel”.

The film is produced by Carolina Brasil (Stone Horus Media) in association with Daemon Hillin (Hillin Entertainment). The soundtrack is composed by veteran Brazilian film composer talent Daniel Figueiredo who also produced some songs composed by the director Lucca Vieira himself especially for the movie, creating a very interesting music soundscape for the picture.