Seattle filmmaker SJ Chiro spent nine years making her first feature, Lane 1974, which debuted at SXSW and will play to eager audiences at the Seattle International Film Festival. It’s a beautiful coming-of-age period piece, full of meticulous details and a firmly rooted 1970s Northern California aesthetic. Like Captain Fantastic, a SIFF favorite from 2016, the plot deals with an “alternative” family subject to the whims and principles of an idealistic parent. But unlike Captain Fantastic, which Chiro described as “a beautiful fairy tale,” Lane 1974 embraces the unpleasant reality.
Captain Fantastic certainly explored the negative aspects of freewheeling, intellectual hippiedom, but Lane 1974 more realistically captures the way in which unusual and high-minded parenting can be controlling and destructive. This realism comes from two sources: Clane Hayward’s memoir, The Hypocrisy of Disco, and the eerily similar childhood experiences of writer and director Chiro.