FLOPPIES

Floppies is a 15-minute family drama, an intimate glimpse into the complicated relationship between an artist son and his dementia-addled father as they attempt to communicate by collaborating on a one page comic. As they bring this comic to life, they recall flashbacks to key moments in each of their lives.

This film is inspired by the real relationship that I had with my father Paul Cappello, who lived with frontotemporal dementia for several years before his death in 2017 at age 59. This is something we actually did together. There have been so many stories about death and grieving, but I felt that not many depict the Long Grieving - anticipation, dread, stiltedness, anxiety, confusion, regret - like what I had experienced for years anticipating my father's inevitable death. I wanted to depict the prolonged battle against apathy that can occur when a loved one is diagnosed with a terminal illness, as well as the struggles to suppress one's trauma and experience joy in the minutia of life that can come with that. My approach was to depict little moments of happiness in a big way, and to portray those living with dementia with humanity and jubilation.

I began developing Floppies in spring 2021 while still very much chewing over my own grief. What started as a form of personal journaling quickly developed into a screenplay. I had been working as a professional filmmaker in post-production on corporate projects, series, and shows for several years by then, and I was desiring a return to personal independent filmmaking. So I decided to turn my script for Floppies into my next project.

My team and I shot the film in July 2021, and post-production was completed by Spring 2022. My hope with Floppies, as an artist, is to encourage other filmmakers to make personal films on shoestring budgets, and show that a strong, impactful story can reach people.