CFF 2024: Daughter of the Sun

Exquisitely crafted, “Daughter of the Sun” delivers both rural melancholy and Lovecraftian horror in a way that’s sublime and shattering.

Sometimes, a movie comes along that…

That phrase has been used to anchor the reviews for countless movies. It’s been overused to the point of not meaning anything anymore, yet it often rings true for disciples of cinema. At the risk of turning you off before I have a chance to win you over, allow me to indulge in the cliche once more.

Sometimes, a movie comes along that moves you in ways you were not expecting. For me, that movie is the latest film from Ryan Ward, Daughter of the Sun.

In 2009, Ward introduced us to his moderately tragic, exponentially anguished antihero in Son of the Sunshine. You don’t have to have seen the first film to enjoy this decades-in-the-making sequel. However, the end of Daughter of the Sun will leave you with many questions, which are answered if you’ve seen the first film (now available to rent or buy on FlixFling or potentially available on YouTube).

Ward writes, produces, directs, and stars as the main character, Sonny Johnns.

He is a visionary filmmaker with an eye for endless sunset fields, sighing sky ambiance, and midnight bonfire embers. In his latest foray into raw emotional magic, he makes the solemn dusk mise-en-scène of Son of the Sunshine even more dreamlike.

Sonny and his 12-year-old daughter, Hildie (Nyah Perkin), exist in almost constant displacement. On the run and suffering from an extreme case of Tourettes Syndrome, Sonny will protect his daughter at any cost.

It is revealed that Sonny can heal living things with his hands when they glow bright purple (think Richard Stanley’s Color Out of Space) and he touches them. The first film insinuates how he gained this ability. While his daughter didn’t exist in the 2009 original, she displays slivers of the same power.

In their travels, they encounter a small cult of (seemingly) joyful and welcoming misfits. They “know” who Sonny and Hildie are and understand they hold great importance. Sonny doesn’t care about being galactically important, though. He only wants to provide a safe and normal life for Hildie.

Their cosmically mysterious hosts show their true intentions when it is revealed that their leader has been drawing visions of the two long before they arrived.

However, their Lovecraftian desires are more horrible than the mind can conceive.

The details and denouement, as per usual with this reviewer, are withheld.

This film is so cinematically holy and big, like an endless filmstrip sky. It has a poet’s soul and wants to instill hope in your heart. Though you will sometimes loathe humanity, at other times, you will bask in its inherent honor.

The screenplay is authentic, heartfelt, and lyrical.

Ward has a keen eye for breathtaking wide open spaces while portraying them as prisons when necessary. Sonny’s protective instincts for Hildie are the film’s soul, but its heart beats the sad, black blood of homelessness. Perhaps it’s more appropriate to call it displacement, as home is wherever your loved ones are.

This film is a feeling; it’s an hour and forty-seven-minute ugly cry. It’s never entirely fair to compare one work of art to another, but if I must draw comparisons, I’d say it’s reminiscent of films like Tideland, Sling Blade, and Lightning Bug.

Have a hanky or two on hand because this movie is so unsettled yet pure-hearted and beautiful.