TOM+ILSAA pair of doomed misfits,
a washed-up boxer and a pretty prostitute,
hit the road and discover a lust for life.
TOM+ILSA defies genres.
It’s a road movie, a buddy film,
a dark, unpredictable comedy
filled with action. And romance.
THE BRONX 1999Tom and Ilsa are lost souls who believe they have very little time left on this earth. Tom is dying from lung cancer. Ilsa has AIDS. Then fate brings them together and suddenly they’ve never felt more alive. They escape the Bronx and its violent pimps, ruined barflies and unfaithful lovers. They hit the road in a stolen pimp-mobile with no destination in mind.
This unlikely couple turn heads and raise eyebrows as they free-wheel their way south. While watching TV in a seedy motel room Ilsa sees a faith healer laying on hands and working miracles. She decides they need to head for Mexico to be cured. Along the way they gather a little gang of misfits which grows into a true family when they arrive in a town on the Mexican coast. It is here that Tom and Ilsa discover finding love and forgiveness might be the greatest miracle of all.
This town was where Tom and his family came to vacation before his wife died and his life fell apart. They had good times here. That’s why Tom’s daughter, Eileen, sought refuge here when she ran away. Father and daughter haven’t seen each other since. Now, thirteen years later, Eileen reveals she was pregnant when she ran away. Tom has a grandson.
Eileen invites Tom and his strange friends to spend the night at her cottage. They end up staying for days. And for some long crazy nights too. Tom and Eileen cautiously reconnect as he builds a bond with his newfound grandson. Eileen can’t believe how much her father has changed. And just as she is about to ask him to hang around, Ilsa reveals Tom his dying. But this is far from the end of our story…
THE CHARACTERS
TOMTom came to the Bronx to be a boxer years ago. Somehow the tough guy who could drop a man with a jab has ended up getting worked over by life.
Tom lost his wife and daughter a while back and now lives with a woman who cares even less for him than he does for her. He loves horse racing, his harmonica and cigarettes. He really loves cigarettes.
Bartending in a dive bar, he’s been off the books for years. When he is diagnosed with lung cancer he has no health insurance or safety net to fall back on. At his lowest ebb he meets Ilsa and suddenly, he’s never felt more alive.
ILSA Ilsa has the kind of looks that stop men in their tracks. Then they realize what she is and quickly look the other way.
But Ilsa is too tired and strung out to care. She works the mean streets of the Bronx as a prostitute. Her pimp uses her heroin addiction to keep her working even though she is HIV positive. She makes sure to protect her johns, and doesn’t hide her diagnosis. It sounds crazy, but Ilsa is also a germaphobe. And she dreams of escaping her brutal life one way or another. Then she falls into the swirling Harlem river with Tom and everything changes as she becomes the Bronx Bonnie to his Clyde.
EILEEN, PHILLIP + SHYEileen and her son live in a pink cottage in a small town on the Mexican coast. She doesn’t talk about how she got here or where she came from. Not even to her girlfriend, Dora. Dora thinks they should live together, but Eileen still has her lapsed Catholic guilt to contend with. And the ghosts from her past that keep her awake at night.
Phillip is a twelve-year-old who doesn’t know where he belongs. He has good reason. Phillip grew up in a Mexican town but he’s American. He is black but his mother is white. And she is a lesbian with a long time girlfriend. The local kids pick on Phillip and he fights back. He wants to be a priest and a boxer when he grows up. This freaks Eileen out because it reminds her of her father.
Shy is a Country & Western singer who dreams of being a star. Thing is he is black and gay. And that’s an issue with some of his audiences. That’s why Shy carries a gun. And why a cowboy abusing Ilsa ends up all shot to hell in a honky-tonk motel.
THE LOCATIONSThe Beautiful Bronx
Tom once had another life with a wife and a child, but that is gone now. His apartment feels unloved. It is shabby and dark. The subway he rides each day is trash strewn and graffiti tagged. The Irish bar where Tom works is a real dive full of lost souls. Ilsa lives in a ratty apartment paid for by a sleazy pimp who uses her addiction to keep her on the bleak streets of Hunt’s Point.
It is only after Tom and Ilsa have their crazy run in on a bridge over the Harlem River that we see hope for our two unlikely soulmates. Somehow the apartments become brighter, the diners more colorful, and the streets look like a way out instead of a dead end.
On The Road…
As Tom and Ilsa escape the Bronx, more colors come into play, and the harsh glare of bare bulbs is replaced with sun flare and sunset glow. The pair of doomed misfits raise eyebrows as they wander small towns and shack up in quirky hotels. Tom drives the pimp-mobile into a parade and Ilsa grabs a huge flag and waves to the confused crowd. Then they free-wheel for Mexico.
On the way, Tom and Ilsa stop at a honky-tonk roadhouse where a gay Country & Western singer pulls a gun and saves Ilsa from a crazed client. Suddenly the drive to Mexico turns into a frantic dash for the border that ends at a lonely desert crossing. When the sun comes up our little gang of desperadoes find themselves standing on a white sand beach by a sparkling blue sea.
The Mexican Coast
Fishing brought Tom and his family to this beach town all those years ago. It’s the happy memories of those family trips that drew Eileen here after she ran away from the Bronx. She isn’t the only American in town. There are enough Yankee escapees and cash strapped retirees for an American owned video store and English speaking services on Sundays. But this off-the-map Mexican town tucked in a beautiful bay, exists in both Tom and Eileen’s minds as a memory of happier times, when their family was complete. It is hope made real. The physical and emotional opposite of the Brutal Bronx.
FILMSCOMPARABLE TO TOM+ILSA
Four very different films that all have something of TOM+ILSA about them. In BONNIE & CLYDE two broken people sew chaos as they go on the run. DALLAS BUYERS CLUB tells the story of a doomed man who finds redemption in the people he comes to love as he embraces the time he has left. And HALLEY, the willful out-of-work stripper in THE FLORIDA PROJECT, is the absolute embodiment of Ilsa. But it is LITTLE MISS SUNSHINE that is closest to TOM+ILSA with a quirky band of people who hit the road for the unlikeliest of reasons. It’s funny as hell, but grounded with flawed characters who go through dark moments before they arrive at a heart warming ending.
In LITTLE MISS SUNSHINE the viewer never knows where the story is going next. It is that same unpredictable quality that makes TOM+ILSA so watchable. And while our ending isn’t the one viewers expect, It is the one they want for this band of mixed-up misfits.
