The trailer for Long Goodbye opens with a straight shot of a woman with shoulder-length hair and a jean jacket walking briskly away from the camera through the Morgan Ave subway station. We can’t see her face. One of the next scenes lingers on two friends chatting on a couch, with one of the guys uttering some language that feels rather stalker-y: “I drive around and clear my head and find myself parked outside of her place. I’m not going to do anything…I don’t know. Maybe she wants me to?”
The film’s synopsis is less foreboding than its trailer: “Long Goodbye is the story of Avery and Matthew. Two aimless, Brooklyn transplants both trying to find meaning in their lives. They begin finding comfort in a fantasy relationship with one another that doesn’t really exist.”
Sounds like a lot of relationships we’ve all had as twenty or thirty-somethings in New York fatigued by the endless swiping left on Tinder. But what’s really unique about Long Goodbye is just how much of its script is rooted in the heart and soul of Brooklyn. Much of the cast and crew, including director Christopher Vernale, hails from the borough. The film was even shot in local hangouts like The Anchored Inn, Molasses Books, Mirror Tea House and Angry Wade’s. It’s that local connection that ought to drive viewers to see it this Sunday, June 10 at the Art of Brooklyn Film Festival (AoBFF).
A screenshot of the trailer for Long Goodbye (Credit: Long Goodbye)
Long Goodbye caps off the edgy lineup of the AoBFF, the programming of which ranges from panels on imagining immigrants in the cinematic space to films like Meme, which seems like a Brooklyn-centric remake of The Ring.
To buy tickets for Long Goodbye and catch the rest of the festival’s schedule, click here.
Long Goodbye screens this Sunday, June 10 at 5 p.m. at the Art of Brooklyn Film Festival, located at Founders Hall, St. Francis College (180 Remsen St, Brooklyn).