Director: Kaya Melüh
Writer: Kaya Melüh
Cast: Kaya Melüh, Oskar Tiago, Hanna Lim
Running time: 18mins
I want to be clear before we get into today’s review, When we fall is many things that I want to see from independent cinema. It has visual flair, it touches on hard-hitting social themes, and it finds the time and space to let its central performers inhabit their characters through some impeccably measured dialogue.
Where it gets into problems, is with its young creator’s detemination to cover as much ground as possible, in just 18 minutes. There are at least two distinct films here; and while it is possible to use tonal dissonance to great effect when depicting a lead character at war with themselves and the world around, here, we never get the moment of synthesis required to make that work.
The film is bookended with two ballet sequences, with writer-director-star Kaya Melüh en pointe to deliver a nerve-inducing Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy. In the first, contrary to the joy you might expect to see flow forth from the performance, Tessa (Melüh) is rigid and timid. Spotlit from above, a grand wide shot painting Tess as lost and alone in a sea of black; while sudden close-up sequences recast her sweeping arms as floundering amid an oppressive, overbearing gloom.
Awakening, panicked, from this apparent nightmare, we see that the pressures applied to Tessa have taken a toll on her body and mind. Retreating inward, she finds little solace between the hectoring tones of her dance instructor at school, or the nagging parental super-egos at home. At every turn, her feelings are minimised and belittled, while she finds the vicarious ambitions of others transplanted for her own desires.
Things seem to be spiralling out of control, when Noah (Oskar Tiago) enters the picture. An art student from elsewhere in the college, the two bond over a feeling that they don’t belong – and perhaps a realisation they actually don’t want to meet the standards imposed upon them by their respective disciplines.
The conversation is beautifully filmed, making the most of the shadow and contrast of the echoing studio to amplify Noah and Tessa’s status, cut adrift in the grand expectations of establishment art. At the same time, Melüh’s script is touching, understated, and willing to leave things ambiguous where appropriate. While it points towards a more hopeful future for both of them, it doesn’t push too hard to deliver simple solutions to the wider issues the film touches upon. There is a hint that at least we may find solace in friendship – but there is not the implication so many stories like this hit on, that just talking to someone is a cure-all.
The final moments see Tessa take to the stage again, then. But this time, the rigidity is gone, while the cold light of the opening scene is warmer – and Tessa basks in it with a smile. She is still in the same scenario where someone else is calling the shots in her life, a grander reckoning is still ahead perhaps. But with the confidence companionship brings, she has allowed herself to believe that the future may yet be brighter – and as the credits play, camcorder footage of a children’s ballet recital (presumably from Melüh’s own archive) skips and glitches in front of a live audience. Maybe a nod to the idea Tessa’s inner child is being revived, and that she may be on the way to reconnecting with the joy she once found through dance.
That is a wonderful story. What doesn’t work is what happens between those beats. And that comes with a trigger warning – because those scenes touch on eating disorders.
There is absolutely a need to discuss eating disorders through cinema. This kind of storytelling can be a powerful way of breaking through social stigmas, and reaching those affected with a message that they are not alone. It can also present an opportunity to prompt audiences to think about the way they behave to the people in their lives – to examine the pressure they place on their children, for example, to succeed; and the dangerous extremes they may be pushing their kids to, when they seek to reclaim ‘control’ on their lives by the most devastating of means.
In a feature length version of When we fall, this might even have been the right story to do that in. But at just 18 minutes, the presentation of eating disorders is hasty, heavy-handed, and does not have the space to do this important issue justice. Most problematically, the scene in which the matter is made explicit (where Lynn – played by Hanna Lim – drives Tessa to the point of a nervous breakdown by obnoxiously chewing potato chips in her face) comes away feeling more like it was there for shock value, than anything else. And while the film’s final third makes it clear this is not that kind of project, that earlier moment may mean fewer viewers make it that far in the first place.
Moving away from that sequence, Melüh looks to cram as much expository dialogue into her character’s head as possible – in a way that feels unnecessary. The echoing put-downs of her parents are never far from her thoughts, filling in gaps that Melüh could have trusted the audience’s imagination with instead. There is even some potential foregrounding that Tessa’s feelings for Noah might be romantic – and while I’m not necessarily for or against either version of that story, it isn’t needed here. We can draw our own conclusions, and in the space that frees up, the film might find opportunities for more of what made it so special – its core conversation between Melüh and Tiago.
It’s important to be ambitious. But maturity is knowing how to pick your battles, to prioritise the right story for the moment, and to have the patience to believe there will opportunities to tell other tales later. When we fall suffers for trying to take on too much at once, in too little time. That is not all bad news, though. As one of our younger filmmakers, Kaya Melüh has shown levels of skill in writing, directing and performing that people twich her age are still developing. As she continues on her early journey, I can’t wait to see how this bright new storyteller develops.
