The first trailer for “Christmas Eve in Miller’s Point” was released on Wednesday, Oct. 9, with a seemingly intentional, era-appropriate voice-over to set the tone. The preview is currently available to stream en masse on YouTube, courtesy of IFC Films.
For critics and regular filmgoers far and wide, the latest feature from indie filmmaker Tyler Taormina (“Ham on Rye,” “Happer’s Comet”)—born and raised in Smithtown—has been likened to a Norman Rockwell painting come to life. A colorful cavalcade of Long Island Christmastime creatures of the night. A vibe-over-plot encapsulation of an intimately shared experience.
It's done palpable damage on the international film fest circuit all year long—starting with a global premiere as part of the“Director’s Fortnight” leg of the 2024 Cannes Film Festival back in May.
Now, it’s high time for “Christmas Eve in Miller’s Point” to return home where it was made a year and a half ago—predominantly in the late night/wee morning hours in and around Smithtown, Holbrook and Selden.
This high-scale indie, SAG-certified production melded established star power and local hires earning their big breaks, all of whom joined together for a common goal: to recreate the magic of those most-anticipated annual family gatherings that always seemed to have more attendees back when you were a kid.
“On Christmas Eve, the Balsano family gathers for what could be their last holiday in their ancestral home on Long Island. As the night wears on and generational tensions arise, teenager Emily (Matilda Fleming) and her cousin Michelle (Francesca Scorsese) sneak out with their friends to claim the wintry suburb for their own,” reads the Hamptons International Film Festival (HIFF) programming preview of the film.
HIFF artistic director David Nugent, who first screened ‘Christmas’ at Cannes, called the film a “snowglobe memory of a film.”
The festival hosted the film’s North American premiere screenings at East Hampton Regal UA on Sunday, Oct. 6, and Monday, Oct. 7.
Get a HIFF of This! Tyler Taormina Wins ‘Next Exposure Grant’ for Filming in Suffolk
On behalf of Suffolk County Executive Ed Romaine, Diana Cherryholmes from the Suffolk County Film Commission presented Taormina with the ‘Next Exposure Grant’ —a total of $3,000—ahead of Sunday night’s screening for his efforts shooting his passion project in Suffolk County.
To a sold-out audience, Taormina revealed he and writing partner Eric Berger’s past and latest work are all “very much about growing up on Long Island.”
“This movie is a real way of me trying to go back into the past of my early memories growing up here. And have as much gratitude as I can, while also acknowledging how truly weird Long Island is. But I love it,” he said, later adding that he and Berger’s creation is “born from a rapport of remembering.”
“Digging back into this world that we left in our adult life—it’s a certain nostalgic look into the past,” he said. “Wanting to reconcile life—the parts that have left us.”
Conceived, pitched and marketed with a “Home Alone” meets “Dazed and Confused” framework, the film has, expectedly so, been heralded as a “2-for-1” special; there is something in it for audience members of all ages and film palettes.
Older generations will appreciate its 2006 specificity adorned in a coat of ‘80s retro-ness, for good measure. Millennials can just as easily get down with a hero of their youth, Michael Cera (also executive producer)— who attained instant stardom running from the police on his “path to the party” glory in 2007’s iconic teen romp “Superbad”—now assuming said eclectic cop-on-the-prowl role in a career wink, extended cameo.
Even younger generations will be comforted by familiar faces from their universe, like TikTok’s Lev Cameron as Greg Falk. Cameron is one of the standouts of the second thread Fleming and Scorsese happily establish, their need for speed and lust for hot bagels pulling them further from the bloodline back at Grandma’s (Mary Reistetter—yes, relation) house and closer to their “everyone wishes they had friends like us” surrogate family.
A less-than-hodgepodge assemblage of carefully curated, classic diner table-top needle-drops—or as Taormina described them, “Christmas songs that aren’t quite Christmas songs”—score the film’s cacophony of good vibes lifted from greater memories.
The frost in its “snow globe scenery” production design and soul are accompanied by a total haze of tonal trippiness threatening as subtly as it possibly may to win out over the big bad adversary called “loss of innocence,” which looms with its naughty list-netting fixations on shattering said glass by the end-credits roll.
Therefore, those who adored Taormina and his Omnes Films crew’s shoe-string indie breakout, 2019’s “Ham on Rye,” a surrealist teen comedy IndieWire reviewed as “John Hughes if he directed on LSD,” won’t balk in the slightest at the company’s climb up the engine latter from arthouse to main event movie-making.
On Casting: Post-HIFF Premiere Q & A Featuring Tyler Taormina, Ben Shenkman and Sawyer Spielberg
Sawyer Spielberg (“Masters of Air”), cast as burnout ring-leader “Splint” that no so-called rebel-on-the-rise in town dare tussle with, lest they face his ecstatic wrath, commended the local crew and resources who helped him prepare for the role.
“I looked so f—-ng high,” Spielberg wryly quipped, to resounding laughter from the audience. “The makeup artist was incredible. I wasn’t expecting that. I’m a California native, I don’t have a New York accent. I worked with a lot of people who had Long Island accents, and I hope I did it justice—oh no, I’m still in character!”
Spielberg met Taormina through mutual friend, ‘Christmas Eve’ producer and fellow Smithtown native, Krista Minto. “Tyler calls me up… ‘Do you want to play somebody who is completely out of whack? Completely out of touch with reality? And is so far gone?’ And I said, ‘Yeah, that sounds great, sounds like a nice break from my own reality. Sign me up.’”
The actor adds, “I loved shooting out on Long Island too. There needs to be more projects shot out here. There’s a lot of great community and production. I loved Tyler’s attention to detail with everything. You really get sucked into it. You feel like you’re there. He’s really sensitive and vulnerable, and I love that about his work. It was an honor to be a part of it.”
Ben Shenkman (“Billions”)—recruited via cold text, and a subsequent “Ham on Rye” recommendation from none other than Michael Cera—starred as “Lenny,” father of the lead Emily, and who’s married into the Balsano bunch.
He says you “understand the locks you’re in” with TV, whereas with something like this, “you just simply surrender to something that you know you won’t fully understand yourself until you sit in the audience” to watch the finished film, as he had just done for the first time.
“I was absolutely surprised and absolutely not surprised at the same time, if that makes sense. It fully realized something that was on the page to start with,” he said. “You’re surrounded by these people—and he’d created this amazing company, some actors, some non-actors—and we all just hung out, late into the night, didn’t know when you were going to be used… that’s a totally different and very pleasurable contrast. It’s such a privilege to know that you’re just going to play around and have these things harvested, and then that will be spun into something that is completely out of one individual.”
“The cast is obviously such an enormous labor of love in this movie,” Taormina said. “For some reason or another, I love to have these movies with an enormous ensemble cast. It activates a curiosity in me. The way the casting process works—I want to find people who make me feel something inside. When I feel that they stir something up in me, literally, then I think they’re right for the film.”
Also starring Elsie Fisher (“Eighth Grade”), Maria Dizzia (“Orange is the New Black”) and Gregg Turkington (“Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quintumnia”) “Christmas Eve in Miller’sPoint” earned rave reviews from the Variety, Deadline and Hollywood Reporter triumvirate, amongst other outlets—and currently sits at 95% “certified fresh” on Rotten Tomatoes.
In Select Theaters November 8, Everywhere November 15!
The logistically complicated, and consequently quite iconic fire truck parade scene—shot in St. James in collaboration with the Smithtown Fire Department—was teased in the trailer. After its theatrical unleashing, one HIFF attendee loudly whispered mid-screening: “...this is so iconic Long Island.”
“When people see it [the fire truck parade scene], it’s even more surreal in the film. To film it was extremely cold. The crafty table had completely frozen. You couldn’t take milk out of the jug. The cast members were very generous to stay,” said Taormina. “Krista [Minto] and I talked to the fire department, to be involved. But they also brought an entire fleet of firefighters to be a part of the film. When I see it on film—I see all the people very proud to be a part of this institution; to show themselves to the town. It was so beautiful.”
Having released such high-performing classics as 2002’s family ensemble comedy “My Big Fat Greek Wedding” and 2014’s coming-of-age drama “Boyhood,” IFC knew what they were getting into when they signed on to this global and local box-checker that hopes to see box-office success in its forecast. The film’s resonance is as far-reaching as it is specially baked for the community that raised up its creators.
With a “punchline, punchline, gut-punch” formula, and a heart as golden as a ticket to Willy Wonka’s Chocolate Factory accidentally left behind on the L-I-Double-R, “Christmas Eve in Miller’s Point” captures the free spirit of priceless Long Island lore-keepers.