‘The Drama’ Movie Review: An Uncomfortable, Bleakly Funny Conversation Starter For Couples
Photo from A24
From Jeremy Kibler
If you already know writer-director Kristoffer Borgli’s darkly comic specialties (Sick of Myself and Dream Scenario), as well as the on-brand offerings of A24, then you know The Drama is not some glossy nuptials romantic-comedy for a mainstream audience. Borgli’s film is more challenging than that, asking tough questions for not only the audience but also its characters in reassessing the person they thought they knew. Undeniably uncomfortable but also both bleakly funny and delicately nuanced, The Drama is as much a conversation starter as Force Majeure when too much honesty can obliterate a relationship.
Cambridge museum curator Charlie (Robert Pattinson) and publishing editor Emma (Zendaya) met awkwardly cute in a coffee shop, and now they’re engaged. It’s a week before the wedding and they’re in the midst of planning. While taste-testing meals and wine for the wedding with couple friends Mike (Mamoudou Athie) and Rachel (Alana Haim)—also the best man and maid of honor—they decide to play a game. Each one of them reveals the worst thing they’ve ever done, and while it seems to be a judgment-free zone, it becomes Emma’s turn, and her sin is apparently unforgivable. That’s when everything spirals.
What might begin as a sweet romantic comedy chronicling the beginning of a relationship, The Drama certainly upends expectations beyond that setup with a level of daring and thoughtfulness. The crucial revelation from Emma’s past that is being danced around will either lose audiences right away or keep one involved and spark debate, which is hopefully the takeaway. The thing about the “worst thing” Emma has ever done is that it is very troubling, even if there was no follow-through, but how much slack do we give a person when they were a different person back then and struggled with mental health? If we judge this person but we, ourselves, have committed a different kind of “worst,” are we being hypocritical then? If we don’t overshare to our partners, are we liars? How bad would your partner’s past misdeed have to be to get cold feet before saying “I do” on the big day? Humans are complex and fascinating, and The Drama understands this, finding humor in the discomfort but not being flippant or shocking for shock’s sake with the subject matter, either. The off-kilter but seamless editing by Borgli and co-editor Joshua Raymond Lee is also key to the storytelling, blending the current action with flashbacks once we know what we know.
Zendaya and Robert Pattinson are both turning in exceptional work here as Emma and Charlie (perhaps their best to date), cementing just how truly versatile and surprising they can truly be as performers. It would be easy to pit these two against one another and simplify this “dilemma,” but they make both characters complicated and find enough shading to make us care. In juicy supporting roles, Alana Haim gets to be spiky and seething as Rachel, while Mamoudou Athie is the more level-headed counterpoint as Rachel’s husband Mike. Zoë Winters (Materialists) also brings comedic spark to her few scenes as the once-happy couple’s wedding photographer.
Thorny, provocative, and increasingly tense, The Drama doesn’t take a morally superior high road, nor does it just end in mean-spirited cynicism. It confronts the ugliest parts of humanity during a naturally jittery point in someone’s adult life—a wedding—and tightens the screws. See it with someone you think you know and love.
Rating: 4/5
The Drama is now in theaters.
