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Two great films against the infamy of adulthood. Defoe today and Benigni yesterday as the great maternal protagonists of our devastated and vile times. Two films to hold on to what's left of (our) humanity and hope (not) for a second infancy of history.

Like last year's American Honey, Baker's film is a timely paradox—call it magical neorealism—depicting hardscrabble poverty without the attendant sermonizing. In both of these melancholy summertime gambols, imagination can make adventure out of just getting by.

As with Tangerine (2015), it takes a few scenes to become accustomed to Baker's rhythm and tone, but once you're there, it flies.

When Moonee switches off the motel's generator on the hottest day of the summer, Baker sets his camera far back from the action, framing the Magic Castle like a pink-and-purple dollhouse and turning its inhabitants into angry action figures. . . . The comically detached point of view and subtly sophisticated choreography (all of the film's major characters come into view over the course of 30 seconds) recalls the refined master-shot slapstick of French master Jacques Tati's Playtime.

The loping, summery rhythms of the movie allow the viewer to savor its unusual characters, have-nots who should not arouse our pity but rather our shame. Little Brooklynn Prince is a delight and a heartbreak as Moonee and Willem Dafoe gets to strut both his charisma and compassion as the Magic Castle's harried manager. The ending turns poetic realism into poetic license, and is a beautiful grace note.

The film's uniqueness gives it a fragile feel: It seems impossible that the setting, acting, and directing could all align in a way that manages to make the story feel this right — but also doesn't condescend to its subjects . . . Baker's films are fueled by this baffling alchemy: a mixture of classic film school pretension, a deep appreciation for genre, a devotion to social realism, and a rejection of most of the qualities that make a film "marketable" in contemporary Hollywood.

The storytelling in The Florida Project is subtle, telling the adult viewer just enough while maintaining the unadulterated optimism that commonly filters a young child's gaze on the world. And yet it is not a lens that condescends to the child; the film makes clear Moonee's inordinate insight, and the audience is compelled to marvel at the boundlessness of her imagination and joie de vivre.

Shot in an observational neorealist style but with an eye for the gaudy, sherbet-coloured beauty of the setting, it's a warm, sympathetic piece. Non-judgemental about mothering, it shows the sheer rule-breaking fun of Moonee and co's behaviour, while acknowledging its very real risks . . . Full of compassion and curiosity about its characters' fragile lives, this memorable drama establishes Baker as among cinema's most original chroniclers of childhood.

Baker's aesthetic project might be described as making time stand still. Like an antithesis of Richard Linklater's Boyhood (which depicted the cumulative effects of time), The Florida Project conveys a sense of endless stasis. Baker doesn't give dramatic emphasis to any individual scene; instead he grants a sense of wide-eyed wonder to major and minor events alike, and this gives the film a uniform tone that belies any sense of dramatic development.

It's presented as a heartwarming story—the press notes describe it as "warm, winning, and gloriously alive" movie that "declares boldly and proudly, that anywhere can be a Magic Kingdom—it just depends on how you see it." If you wish hard enough, it might almost be a Disney story. The Florida Project is certainly lively, but it is anything but redemptive. In spite of its episodic documentary quality, it traces an overdetermined downward spiral.

The movie is extremely difficult to describe. Critics have been acknowledging this in their reviews! Something happens in this movie – a mood, a vibe – completely separating it from the grim surroundings... None of this, though, accurately describes the powerful experience of Florida Project. I thought my heart would explode at the end (for example).

It's a reminder that a child's-eye view necessitates doing more than crouching the camera low to see the world from the POV of someone 4 feet tall. That's clearly a key ingredient. But you can't just remake the world in images: You have to remake the world as an experience.