A Note from
VICTOR NUNEZ
WRITER / DIRECTOR
Native of Florida, member of the founding boards of the Independent Feature Project and the Sundance Film Institute, and currently teaching Writing & Directing at the Florida State University College
of Motion Picture Arts, Victor Nunez is a member of the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts & Sciences, and has been making independent movies for over four decades.
In Italian Neo-Realism Character, Story, and Place are deeply interconnected. Here, instead of simply being a backdrop for action, Place is the pivotal shaper of character and the nature of the stories told. This outlook has always made sense to me.
​
There is still much of dream to such stories, but these dreams grow closer to home. Whether it be a street in Brooklyn, a ranch in Montana, or a house on the Gulf Coast, a sense of place is guide, inspiration, and witness to the filmmaking quest. In a time of disconnected online engagement, this approach to film story remains an important access point in our effort to find our way back home.
​
My movies focus on the inner journey as well as the outward actions of their protagonists with the audience invited into an interior space that may initially feel strange, but that carries within it the possibility of recognition and resolve.
​
The challenge often hovers around the fine line between self-deception and self-awareness. Between fear and openness, bitterness or grace.
The clock is always ticking and there are always consequences. How does one find one’s way?
THE FLORIDA FILMS
GAL YOUNG ’UN (1979)
Dana Preu, David Peck, J. Smith-Cameron
New York, Toronto, and London Film Festivals, as well as the Director’s Fortnight at Cannes. Vincent Canby (New York Times) called it an astonishingly good first feature ... I know very little about Mr. Nunez except that he lives and works in Florida, but if he’s representative of our new regional film makers, things are looking up.
A FLASH OF GREEN (1984)
Ed Harris, Blair Brown, Richard Jordan
New York, Toronto, and Sundance Film Festivals, as well as the Director’s Fortnight at Cannes.
RUBY IN PARADISE (1993)
Ashley Judd, Todd Field, Bently Mitchum, Dorothy Lyman, Allison Dean
New York and Toronto Film Festivals, and the Director’s Fortnight at Cannes. Shared the Grand Prize for Best Dramatic Feature at Sundance. Ashley Judd won the Independent Spirit Award for Best Female Lead. Ruby in Paradise is a breathtaking movie ... the writing, the acting, the lighting, the direction ... you will be looking at a movie that knows exactly what it is about, and how to achieve it. (Roger Ebert)
ULEE’S GOLD (1997)
Peter Fonda, Patricia Richardson, Christine Dunford
Peter Fonda received the New York Film Critics Award and the Golden Globe Award, and was nominated for the Academy Award® for Best Actor. And Janet Maslin (The New York Times) said of the film: beautiful and heartfelt, an oasis of humanity in a season of furious hyperbole ... the star and filmmaker make this story resonate in moving, meaningful ways.
‘Easy Rider’ made Peter Fonda an icon. ‘Ulee’s Gold’ made him an actor to remember.
COASTLINES (2002)
Josh Brolin, Tim Olyphant, Sarah Wynter, Josh Lucas
Nunez’s Florida is produced by a fragile confluence—equal parts weather, dreams and geography—and in perpetual danger of being swept away. Though he describes this thriller as the conclusion to a trilogy that began with RUBY IN PARADISE and continued in ULEE’S GOLD, the connection is neither plot nor recurring characters but a melancholic, ephemeral sense of place. (Maitland McDonagh, TV Guide).
