THE DRAMA (2026), A24's newest viral offering, hasn't left me alone since I left the theater. I'm well aware I'm in the minority when I cal this film absolutely brilliant too. The conversation around the lack of racial politics around Zendaya's Emma (originally written as white) aren't lost on me either. Which makes the rest of review for this film a bit more complicated and nuanced than many that I've seen. I'd much prefer the absence of the racial magnifying glass by a director who isn't equipped to handle it than it handled haphazardly like Luca Guadanino's AFTER THE HUNT (2025). In fact, blackness is politicized by nature. In my opinion, you need to do little more than present blackness (where it is not predominately seen) in order to alienate an audience. This is why there's been such a kerfuffle about this film. Emma is made infinitely more interesting because of her racial identity, Borgli is aware of that and believes that the audience will be forced to fill in the blanks. If we allow ourselves to pull away from the microscopic lens a bit and imagine a world in which Emma, unreliable, was not pushed towards planning the event but rather, is a victim of an apathetic society, one can begin to see the larger commentary at hand here. Just as interesting or perhaps offensive as it is to have a biracial perpetrator, it is also the same as her being forced into the role of a mouth piece for action against said violence. What many audiences and critics seem to echo is that their dissatisfaction comes from their not being a clear radicalized motive and that is why the movie works. Everyone in capable and no one really knows why. Frustrating as this is for many viewers, my one weak spot of the film was around Robert Pattinson's Charlie (Emma's groom to be). I wish this film delved deeper into the foreigner paranoia. The event (referenced as such to avoid spoilers) has become so normalized in American culture that is hardly of any actual shock to the audience. In fact, the dinner scene between both characters and another couple, Mike (Mamoudou Athie) and Rachel (Alana Haim), highlighted this well. Emma drunk confesses to the planning of a horrid act while everyone else shares an act that they committed. The scene right before this, Charlie admits to cyber bullying a peer so badly his entirely family had to move which Rachel excuses as him being an early adolescent and his brain not having formed yet. When Zendaya confesses to something she planned around the same age as Charlie, but did not do, that grace is not extended. Instead, it is met with hostility when Rachel makes a personal connection to family member, vicariously using their experience in order to guilt Emma. In a society where this is so prevalent, neither scenario are implausible. Being a victim of or a knowing a victim of this type of violence is real. In fact, Rachel makes a comment that Mike, also black, grew up around guns to which he corrects her by saying that is false. What is a good question to ask, which I believe Borgli is framing here quite well, is "how do we weight a bad sin?" What is abhorrent or truly unforgivable?
The center piece of this story being one about love really pulls all the strings together. What is more tiring and tense than planning a wedding? Charlie, in his head, has now has his world upended. The reveal not only casts obvious uncertainty about his partner moving forward but, repaints the images of the past as well. It again causes the audience to then reconsider the power of confession and the dangers that come with the truth. Charlie, throughout the rest of the film, oscillates from convincing himself that Emma is still who he loved and convincing everyone else that what she admits to do isn't "bad" because "she didn't do anything." Without a doubt these are arguably career best performances from both Zendaya and Pattinson as well as Haim who is a real knife in this film. Divisive as it is, it is a total knock out for me and one that will no doubt make my top ten by the end of the year. Go in and see if as blind as you can, you'll thank yourself.
The center piece of this story being one about love really pulls all the strings together. What is more tiring and tense than planning a wedding? Charlie, in his head, has now has his world upended. The reveal not only casts obvious uncertainty about his partner moving forward but, repaints the images of the past as well. It again causes the audience to then reconsider the power of confession and the dangers that come with the truth. Charlie, throughout the rest of the film, oscillates from convincing himself that Emma is still who he loved and convincing everyone else that what she admits to do isn't "bad" because "she didn't do anything." Without a doubt these are arguably career best performances from both Zendaya and Pattinson as well as Haim who is a real knife in this film. Divisive as it is, it is a total knock out for me and one that will no doubt make my top ten by the end of the year. Go in and see if as blind as you can, you'll thank yourself.
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