Joe Duca
Exertion Films
Jim Constable, Mary Cate Williams, Daniel Duca
A Ten year old Jo spends her days along the Shenandoah River with her best friend Selma, fishing, scrapping for metal surviving. She get’s her chance when Bill, her abusive junkie stepdad, OD's on heroine. She dumps him in the river and flees when the cops come looking for answers.
Selma in tow, she steals Bill’s beat up Buick, hocks his tools and an old flatscreen for quick cash, and heads off bound for Los Angeles, in hopes of finding her biological father.
As she journeys across the country, we discover the brutal portrait of the dark side of Americana, and the resilience of childhood innocence in the face of abandonment.
2021