Summering
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“We Wanted the Film to Feel Like a Memory, a Dream of Childhood…”: Director James Ponsoldt on His Coming-of-Age Neo-Noir, Summering
In Summering, James Ponsoldt‘s return to cinema following several years of episodic television work, four young girls, best friends about to enter different junior high schools, find their final moments of group bonding upended by a shocking discovery: a dead body. Encountered near a secret spot they dub Terabithia (after the YA novel and film Bridge to Terabithia), the gruesome find turns into a challenge. What if rather than calling the police or telling their parents these friends could actually solve the mystery of this deceased middle-aged man’s identity and cause of death? It’d be both a kind of end-of-summer […]
by Scott Macaulay on Aug 12, 2022 -
Trailer Watch: James Ponsoldt’s Summering
Watch the trailer for James Ponsoldt’s sixth feature film, the girlhood coming-of-age tale Summering. Co-written by Ponsoldt and Benjamin Percy, the film centers on four 11-year-old best friends during the last golden days of summer vacation. Summering immediately evokes the dramatic exploits of Rob Reiner’s Stand By Me and the girlish whimsy of Lesli Linka Glatter’s Now and Then. The trailer reveals a dead body in the woods, the friends’ dogged quest to figure out John Doe’s identity and the stress of navigating newfound adolescence. Summering premiered earlier this year at the Sundance Film Festival. The film’s cast includes Lia […]
by Filmmaker Staff on Jul 18, 2022 -
“It’s Always About Time and Not Having It”: DP Greta Zozula on Summering
With Summering, James Ponsoldt wanted to make a film that his young daughter would appreciate, and the result is a coming-of-age story about four girls planning one final weekend of fun before middle school. They unexpectedly make a discovery in the nearby woods that they keep to themselves, and from there imagination and reality collide in magical realist fashion. Below, cinematographer Greta Zozula explains how she managed the narrative’s tension between magic and realism and how the crew managed to make difficult scenes work with limited time. Filmmaker: How and why did you wind up being the cinematographer of your film? […]
by Filmmaker Staff on Jan 22, 2022 -
“The Movie We Made Is Really Very Close to the Movie I Imagined”: Editor Darrin Navarro on Summering
Summering is James Ponsoldt’s ode to childhood in which four girls who discover something in the woods and make a questionable decision to keep it a secret and solve the mystery on their own. The coming-of-age story also has elements of both horror and magical realism, and keeping close to the perspective of its characters while staying tethered to the reality was crucial for the film. Editor Darrin Navarro discusses striking that balance and how altering the structure of the film gave the audience a way into the narrative. Filmmaker: How and why did you wind up being the editor […]
by Filmmaker Staff on Jan 22, 2022 -
“Real Healing Means Taking All Our Vulnerabilities and Weaknesses and Realizing They’re Also the Source of Our Humanity” | James Ponsoldt, Summering
The last two years have prompted much contemplation and reconsideration of the reasons why we make our films as well as the ways in which we make them. What aspect of your filmmaking—whether in your creative process, the way you finance your films, your production methodology or the way you relate to your audience—did you have to reinvent in order to make and complete the film you are bringing to the festival this year? I think my focus sharpened. And my absolute need to make the film—I had to make it. So much of Summering is about children and their […]
by Filmmaker Staff on Jan 22, 2022 -
The Reopening Hunt: Resuming Production in a Time of COVID
Friday, March 13, 2020, two days after the World Health Organization declared COVID-19 a pandemic, Jamin O’Brien had a check in his hand. The producer was headed to christen a new venture, an adaptation of the nonfiction bestseller The Short and Tragic Life of Robert Peace to be directed by Chiwetel Ejiofor. “I was literally going to deliver the deposit check for our production offices, which were going to open Monday, when we were shut down,” says O’Brien. Now, a little more than a year later, O’Brien is preparing to navigate the world of post-COVID film production for the first […]
by Matt Mulcahey on Apr 8, 2021
