Film phase:Completed
SYNOPSIS
The Patron Saints is a disquieting and hyperrealistic glimpse into life at a nursing home. Bound by the candid confessions of a recently disabled resident, the film weaves haunting images, scenes, and stories from within the institution walls. Sidestepping conventional documentary methods for a heightened cinematic approach to storytelling, filmmakers Brian M. Cassidy and Melanie Shatzky employ lyrical realism and black humor in this charged portrait of fading bodies and minds.
ABOUT THE DIRECTORS
The Patron Saints is co-directed by Melanie Shatzky and Brian M. Cassidy.
The films of Melanie Shatzky and Brian M. Cassidy have screened at the Sundance, Berlin, Toronto and Rotterdam film festivals, the Museum of Modern Art, the National Gallery of Art, and ICA London. Brian and Melanie have won awards at several festivals including the European Media Art Festival, Chicago, New Orleans, Athens, and RIDM in Montreal. In 2012, the duo was nominated for a Gotham Award for Breakthrough Director. Their most recent films are the documentary The Patron Saints and the dramatic feature Francine, starring Academy Award® winner Melissa Leo, which The New York Times called “a small gem.”
NOW PLAYING
The Patron Saints had its world premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival and its international premiere at the International Film Festival Rotterdam. The film won awards at RIDM in Montreal and Planete Doc Review in Warsaw. The Wall Street Journal called it “profound, never lacking in humor or wisdom.” and The Playlist included it in one of their “Best Films of 2012” roundups, calling it “deeply unsettling” and “truly poetic.”