Fest Track On Sirk TV Film Review: THE SILENT TWINS [Cannes Film Festival 2022]
Filmmaker Agnieszka Smoczynska has been taking women's stories and textures of mythology but altering the perception with her own inevitable style. "The Lure" about two mermaids who also ate human flesh approached this and "Fugue" did this from the point of an amnesiac. She continues to up her game with "The Silent Twins" [Un Certain Regard] which is based on a book by Marjorie Wallace (which followed the real life story of two fraternal twins). "The Silent Twins" pushes the texture of sociopathic behavior but between two fraternal twins that have been silent except to talk between themselves. I have seen this kind of silent behavior with fraternal twins but as soon as adolescence kicks in normal communication and the aspect of social interaction do apply and shift the dynamic. Here it goes much further. Establishing the context of what the idea is works for the young versions of two characters (directly in the opening credits)( before they enter adulthood. The two teen/adult characters are played by Letitia Wright and Tamara Lawrence with a precision that is dynamic but it is the flourishes that Smoczynska creates in the modern context of their pathology (the film is set in terms of their teenage years in the late 70s) that dances darkly.
The girls want to be writers and the characters (based on a true life story) and as portrayed here, take their need for experience to the extreme and yet their approach of silence except to each other, is ironic that it leads them into dark places where they have cut themselves off in other ways. Smoczynska always finds the unusual and her films are undeniable in their take though a bit off center. This film is a Focus production but her budget and use of her bigger name star in Wright definitely ups the ante. A lot of the music and animation is based and influenced on the twin girls' actual writing and work. The film also beautifully doesn't judge them or the people they interact with for their experiences. "The Silent Twins" is actually in many ways refreshingly positive even if the girls can't quite ascertain that anything is wrong with what they are doing or that the problem is inevitably solved. This film could be a very dark trip but, in many ways (like Agnieska's earlier films), it plays like a fable undeniably. However the film ultimately shines in its music/musical sequences where the girls sing but not directly in their own voices showing a context of shifting understanding. This is where the film really shines, down to the last shot. B+
By Tim Wassberg
