[Content warning: This article contains spoilers and mentions of gun violence.]
“What is the worst thing you have ever done?” Such is the question asked to the wine-filled Emma (Zendaya) at a dinner party 30 minutes into Kristoffer Borgil’s “The Drama,” drastically altering the remainder of the film.
Emma and Charlie (Robert Pattinson) are getting hitched! At the onset of the film, we spot a photograph of Emma sitting on Charlie’s lap, her hand spreading all five fingers to display her shining engagement ring to the camera. Before its release on April 3, it was difficult to predict what was in store for the movie: With promos foreshadowing an obvious derailment of the couple’s wedding week, anything could go wrong. Did Emma cheat on Charlie? Was she going to leave him at the altar? Did Emma do something so terribly drastic in her past that its confession could cause an entire wedding to be called off?
I have never experienced silence in a theater quite like the one that occurred when Emma’s truth was revealed: When she was 15 years old, she planned to commit a mass shooting at her high school. Yes, she even had a rifle. But do not worry! She changed her mind at the last second because another shooting had occurred on the same day. Ironically, she becomes a gun control activist instead.
Undoubtedly, this reveal was not the melodramatic, subdued storyline I expected upon entering the Roosevelt Theatre on a hazy afternoon. The beginning of the film certainly sets expectations for a standard romance drama screenplay, exhibiting Emma and Charlie’s awkward meet cute in a coffee shop and their endearing “first dance” rehearsal. Here, the editing compellingly bounces between past and present, with the current Charlie crafting his emotional wedding speech to Emma with his best man, Mike (Mamoudou Athie), by his side.
The sharp tonal shifts of the film continue with Emma’s maid of honor, Rachel (Alana Haim). Indeed, both Rachel and Mike were present at Emma’s frightening reveal, and it is safe to say neither were tolerant with her honesty. In particular, Rachel—whose cousin is in a wheelchair due to a shooting—spends the rest of the film desperately attempting to take Emma down. But neither character is without their flaws. Starting this fabled conversation in the first place, Rachel explains that the worst thing she has ever done is lock a mentally disabled child she was babysitting in a closet in the woods overnight. What is going on with these people?
“The Drama” is unlike any film I have seen before. Borgil creates a truly unique scenario for audiences to grapple with. After the reveal, Charlie is unable to find assurance and comfort that Emma has changed from her past. We watch him open a kitchen cabinet and fixate on a mug depicting a rifle, which quickly flashes to the aforementioned engagement photograph with Emma’s fingers now in the shape of a gun, pointed directly at him. Alongside the quick gasps in my theater, Charlie throws the mug into the garbage, which Emma soon uncovers. She goes to confront him, a knife in hand from cutting fruit, and pretends to almost stab him. She does no harm and walks away laughing, but the audience is left with an intense moral dilemma: How far does unconditional love go and has Emma really evolved from her past-self?
Charlie unquestionably is having difficulty deciding. We watch him daydream about Emma dressed in her underwear on their bed, bearing a giant rifle in her hands—an uneasy shot for the audience to experience alongside him. There are constant flashbacks to Emma’s 15-year-old self, including self-taped exposure videos and shots of her practicing her aim. In the present, when Charlie asks Emma why she thought about committing such a horrific act, she says it was chiefly about the “aesthetics” of it all. We also see flashbacks of Emma cursing out a negligent driver and her unprecedentedly slapping Charlie during sex… yikes!
Opposed to seeking a pedagogical approach, the script plays into the absurdity of the situation. As the couple takes their wedding photos, the photographer excessively repeats the word “shot,” instilling discomfort in Charlie, but resonating humorously with the audience (I surely was cracking up). During young Emma’s self-taped confessionals, the computer refuses to cooperate with her, shutting off as she discusses shooting her peers. A usually disturbing dialogue instead resulted in the woman sitting in front of me bursting into laughter. At the wedding itself, a moment of intense build-up culminates in a loud, gun-like sound effect. However, it is merely the DJ plugging in a wrong wire, the sequence, therefore, becoming a “gotcha!” moment.
It is within these scenes where the underlying thematic messaging of “The Drama” lies. As a movie-going audience of modern America, why are we so okay with such grotesque narratives? With constant headlines that remind us of the severe lack of gun control that persists in our country, we have become accustomed, or perhaps numb, to the harrowing reality of mass shootings. Watching Zendaya lustfully pose with a giant rifle ultimately does not disturb us in the way that it should, and Borgil, a Norwegian director who is detached from American gun culture, understands that.
And still, the third act culminates in chaos. Charlie asks his co-worker, Misha (Hailey Gates), the worst thing she has ever done and she reveals she cheated on her long-term partner. Minutes later—even after a discussion about how awful the cheating affected Misha’s life—Charlie makes out with her in his office, somehow becoming the greatest shock of the film. Despite having a boyfriend, Misha is fully on-board with the scandal. And thus, we are left with another arduous dilemma. While Emma has learned and changed from her past, the other characters continue to perpetuate the same cycles even while acknowledging the harm they cause. Should Emma be the one who is meticulously disdained while the other characters carry on with their horrible acts? Rachel’s paradoxical contempt towards Emma also should be interrogated: She locked a kid in a closet, leading to an entire police search, while Emma did not ultimately commit her deed. Which is worse? I am surely not the moral compass, but it does generate discussion that is worth being debated.
Performance-wise, Zendaya delivers the compelling, unexpected characterization of Emma with ease. Her character is quirky, and the past that consumes her appears almost unbelievable. Pattinson’s acting similarly shines within the intense moral bargaining the situation requires. The duo’s chemistry is captivating, and their typical pull on the strings of obsessed Gen-Z cinematics is utilized to entice audiences, at times overshadowing the otherwise strange storyline presented. The score—consisting of quick flute flares and simple chord changes—was on par with the powerful emotional baggage and impressively built a unique sense of anxiety in the audience.
But perhaps the best aspect of the film is the dialogue that the plot creates. Important conversations are left open to the viewer, and with Emma and Charlie completely starting their relationship over at the end of the film, we are left to wonder what it really takes to provide selfless devotion to your partner. Should you tell your partner everything? According to “The Drama,” probably not. The film allows us to question what it means to be in a relationship, but even more importantly it questions why Emma was able to conceive and plan a mass shooting at age 15 in the first place. In time, the audience must reach some conclusion to the events depicted, and maybe the best solution goes unsaid: This is the life we live every day and “The Drama” is ready to challenge it.