What is love? Is it dedication? Is it commitment? Is it an unbridled feeling of sharing every small and big moment of your life with the one you adore so much? Or is it a lie? Is it a compromise? Is it a way of keeping yourself uncomfortable as you adjust to the idiosyncrasies of your life partner? Zendaya and Robert Pattinson’s new dramedy, The Drama, is essentially a ‘dramatic’ look at how love can be a gut punch rather than being an endlessly mushy feeling. A relationship can be a train wreck, before it actually starts to come together.
Writer-Director Kristoffer Borgli presents a near-chaotic and horror-induced side to a romantic relationship leading up to a wedding. It is a complete deconstruction of the romantic genre. Usually, you have couples conflicted by subjects like commitment, infidelity, and miscommunication. But in The Drama, the lead couple experiences a spiral of intrinsic feelings. They go from wanting to spend their whole lives together, to feeling uncomfortable in spending even a minute in each other’s company.
A symbiotic chaos fuels this thrilling romantic caper. The true brilliance of The Drama lies in the volatile chemistry between its leads. Zendaya delivers a performance of remarkable restraint; her character, Emma, is a labyrinth of secrets and quiet power. She possesses a charisma that makes the audience fall in love with her, even as she reveals a past that is increasingly unknowable. Opposite her, Robert Pattinson is a revelation in his character’s vulnerability but somehow his performance always feels a little too restrained and off kilter. Playing Charlie as a man on the brink of a psychological meltdown, Pattinson captures the manic “inner turmoil” of someone whose reality has been fundamentally shifted. But when he has to break into self loathing and love he is less impressive. Together though, Zendaya and Robert create a relationship that feels terrifyingly real. Not because it is imperfect, but because it is so pricked with tension. Borgli’s direction infuses the mundane rituals of wedding planning with a sense of dread, turning a situation leading up to a “happily ever after” into a high-stakes psychological thriller with characters constantly simmering with stress and tension.
There’s plenty of edgy provocation in this literal genre bender. However, The Drama is not a film for everyone, and that is perhaps its most significant gamble. Borgli teeters on the edge of “tastelessness,” pushing the audience’s buttons with a diabolical delight that can feel overwhelming. The film’s “cringe-out-loud” satire and squirm-inducing sequences are designed to alienate as much as they engage. Lad characters keep puking all over the place. While it is an understandable reaction, it does tend to get a little too tedious. At times, the narrative’s commitment to deconstruction feels so aggressive that it risks losing the emotional tether to its characters. While the “horror-induced” style is a fresh take on the genre, some viewers might find the relentless cynicism a bit too caustic for a story that ultimately seeks to understand the human heart.
Despite its prickly nature, The Drama is one of the most provocative and intelligent films of the year. It is a thorny exploration of the primordial desire for connection and the equally strong urge for destruction. By the time the credits roll, you aren’t left with a warm glow, but with a profound sense of contemplation. The end is a positive one with plentiful hope. In love, you should never give up, if you don’t intend to. In the end, the answer to “What is love?” can be resilience, perseverance, reinvention.
Also Read: The Drama Paris Premiere: Zendaya and Robert Pattinson Bring Their Goofy Charm in Style
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