A young woman decides to quit her job at Starbucks and reinvent her life--until she discovers she has MS and can't lose her health care.
logline
Allison (25) works for a major coffee chain that provides her with health insurance but poverty wages. She wants to change her life and become a graphic designer, but these dreams are muted by the grind of the service industry, the cost of college, and the need to pay the bills. Her longtime boyfriend, Holt (27), urges her to reinvent her life, and finally she relents.
Everything is falling into place—the couple moves into a new apartment, Allison reapplies to college and prepares to quit her job. But suddenly, it all falls apart. Allison, through a terrifying, traumatic episode, discovers she has MS. She knows a chronic disease is expensive. She knows that leaving her job—and her health insurance–would bury her in medical bills. This rude awakening brings Holt and Allison’s relationship to the brink, and forces them to stare down their bleak economic future.
synopsis
Barista is a generational narrative about the precarious service worker. It’s about the crippling costs of health care and education, about paying the bills in a lagging economy while still trying move forward. But it’s also about what happens to a couple when moving forward is no longer an option.
I was inspired by the Italian neorealist film movement of the post-war era, and I see a lot of parallels in the post-recession economy we face today. The idea of being trapped in one’s own life is something that most people can identify with. Barista is a true middle class story about being stuck between the life you have and the life you envision for yourself.