A Flash of Green

March 24 · Regal Riviera · 3:30 P.M.

Victor Nuñez, 1984, 131 minutes

“Nuñez lives near the Florida locations of this movie, and he has achieved a real sense of place. We feel the moist heat of the long summer nights, the cynical ways in which everybody knows everybody else’s business, the urgency of unfulfilled people who can smell money, and think it means success.” — Roger Ebert

Ed Harris (fantastic, in an early role) stars as a Florida newspaper journalist who gets a tip about plans for building a new development in a nature preserve. He passes along the tip to an environmental activist — a woman he loves, despite being married. But it’s not long before he begins to feel pressure from the other side. Adapting this neo-Noir from John D. MacDonald’s thriller of the same name, Nuñez keeps the story grounded in complex characters and in the specifics of his native Florida even as the stuff of movie thrillers — bribes, paramilitary groups — escalate the drama.

Though he is best known for directing such acclaimed ’90s independent films as Ruby in Paradise and the Oscar-nominated Ulee’s Gold, Florida-based auteur Victor Nuñez first gained recognition for his acclaimed first feature, 1979’s Gal Young Un. Produced for American Playhouse, A Flash of Green, which had its American premiere at the New York Film Festival and went on to be broadcast on PBS’s American Playhouse, is a high water mark in Nuñez’s rich filmography. Still active today, his steadfast commitment to making films outside of Hollywood and New York has left a lasting impact on American cinema.