Flora and Son had its world premiere at the Sundance Film Festival on January 22, 2023, and was given a limited theatrical release in the United States on September 22, 2023, to be followed by a wide release in Ireland on February 23, 2024. It also began streaming on Apple TV+ worldwide on September 29, 2023. It received positive reviews from critics and was named one of the top 10 independent films of 2023 by the National Board of Review.[5]
Premise
Flora, a single mother living in Dublin, is having trouble with her estranged son Max, a rebellious teenage petty thief. Encouraged by the Gardaí to find Max a hobby, Flora rescues an old guitar from a skip and, with the help of a Los Angeles-based online guitar teacher, discovers that one person's rubbish can be another person's salvation.[6][7]
Original songs for the film come from Carney and Gary Clark, with Clark also writing the score. Clark and Carney had previously collaborated on music for film, stage and television.[10] Speaking at the 2023 Sundance Film Festival, Gordon-Levitt was quoted as saying "I finally got to play music in a movie! It's really true, I've always wanted to do it and I’ve always been a musician at heart and love doing it. I’ve learned to do many things for movies. I've learned to walk on a tightrope or play hockey or, certainly, lots of fighting and shooting and things like that. But this time I was practicing a skill that I've practiced most of my life, but having to do it at a bit more of a skill level than what I was used to."[11] Hewson could play the guitar before they made the film and said all singing she does on screen is her and told The Hollywood Reporter although she had to overcome a "massive, massive fear" of singing in the film, she never turned to her father (musician Bono) for musical tips: "I'd rather sing in front of the entire world."[12]
Release
Flora and Son premiered at the Sundance Film Festival on January 22, 2023.[13] The songs reportedly produced a "spontaneous clap-a-long and rapturous standing ovation" during its first screening.[14] Two days after premiering, Apple Studios bought the distribution rights for "just under" $20 million.[15] It was screened at the Toronto International Film Festival on September 7, 2023.[3] It was released in select theaters in the United States on September 22, 2023, before streaming worldwide on Apple TV+ starting September 29, 2023.[16] It is scheduled to be released in Irish cinemas on February 23, 2024.[17]
Critical reception
On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, 93% of 154 critics' reviews are positive, with an average rating of 7.4/10. The website's consensus reads: "Another music-fueled crowd pleaser from writer-director John Carney, Flora and Son proves almost impossible to resist."[18]Metacritic, which uses a weighted average, assigned the film a score of 76 out of 100, based on 32 critics, indicating "generally favorable" reviews.[19] In The Wall Street Journal, Kyle Smith called the film his favorite of the year.[20]
