A deep scar runs from the base of a man’s skull to his forehead–the first thing the audience notices as he arrives at a birthday party. It immediately becomes clear that the injury has left much more than a physical blemish. Yana Alliata’s debut feature Reeling follows Ryan (Ryan Wuestewald) as he works to put the pieces back together after a life-changing brain injury.
The film begins as Ryan parks his car outside of his sister Meg’s (Nikki DeParis) home. He meticulously looks around his vehicle, pulling out a checklist to make sure he doesn’t forget to bring anything inside. As he walks to the house, he encounters familiar faces, but they’re introducing themselves as if they’d never met. “Remember me?” they say. But Ryan doesn’t remember them. He doesn’t recall his closest friends or even his relatives. Through quiet conversations whispered when Ryan is out of earshot, Alliata cleverly lets the audience in on the secret: Ryan suffers from memory issues after a traumatic accident, and despite his weekly therapy sessions, he’s struggling to assimilate back into the life he once had.
“Ryan suffers from memory issues after a traumatic accident…”
Ryan’s accident is the elephant in the room. Not only do the other guests avoid the topic, but they also sidestep Ryan altogether. His own brother John (Hans Christopher) can barely manage a few words without becoming hostile, clearly holding onto some deeper trauma from the accident. During a relative’s touching speech for the birthday girl, Ryan can’t withhold his laughter (a symptom of his injury), which creates an awkward uneasiness for those listening in. When everyone sits down for dinner, he’s essentially a part of the scenery. He dips in to grab food and then disappears to a chair away from the others. Each of these moments makes Ryan more and more insecure, further isolating him from normalcy. As he sneaks away from the party to look at old family photos, he’s hit with a flash of memory from the accident, revealing a tragic detail that leads to an explosive climax.
From the opening moments of the film, Alliata toes the line between documentary-style filmmaking and traditional narrative storytelling. Perhaps it’s the influence of the executive producer, king of documentaries Werner Herzog, who encourages the realist approach. Non-professional actors, clearly improvised moments, and a handheld camera following Ryan create a grounded atmosphere that audiences can easily immerse themselves in. We’ve all been a part of the awkward moments at family gatherings, and Alliata uses that familiarity to her advantage. The film is so effective because of the tension Alliata is able to quickly create and build on. Michael MacAllister’s forceful, percussion-heavy score unsettles us immediately, swelling during the nerviest moments. Alliata and Amy Miner’s screenplay delivers an array of embarrassing moments without ever feeling too heavy-handed. And Wuestewald’s central performance perfectly pokes and prods, while also empathetically letting the audience in on his struggle.
In the end, we don’t get all the answers. There is no grand resolution. It’s choices like this that make Reeling such an exciting debut feature. Alliata is more interested in digging deep into the trauma and grief of a family reeling from a tragedy than giving audiences a storybook ending. She’s reflecting life as it is, not life as we want it to be. It’s that challenging but relatable journey towards healing that makes this worth the watch.
"…an exciting debut feature..."
