Tribeca Festival 2024: “Ripe!” - Short Film Review
In this sleek, modern age that we’re living in, it’s not surprising that we are seeing a return to the flawed, grainy, warm texture of film. In the same way that young people are flocking to vinyls in droves to hear the crackles and the pops, they’re searching for that same high in the other medium they consume. There's a timeless, imperfection to film. It instantly creates a sense of nostalgia, a hazy memory we’re all experiencing for the first time together. Ripe! uses the sense of nostalgia created by film to tell a story that’s as old as time, one of young love. But young love has never looked this good.
Sophie (Raina Landolfi) is an American college student abroad in Spain. She’s got a boyfriend back home and is struggling to make friends in this foreign country. All of her Duolingo lessons haven’t prepared her enough to feel fully confident speaking Spanish, but there is one place where language doesn’t fully matter - the soccer (sorry, football) field. There, she can’t seem to stop staring at fellow player Gloria (Rita Roca). The two have an on-field rivalry that comes to a head when Sophie accidentally breaks Gloria’s arm.
courtesy of Tusk
The first two minutes of the nineteen-minute short film do more for character and plot development than some three-hour movies ever achieve. It’s a stunning opening, one that brings Call Me By Your Name to mind as Sophie eats a peach. Finally, Ripe! is giving queer women their own peach movie. The film’s opening is frantic, yet restrained as it lays out the playing field for Sophie and Gloria. Voicemails from Sophie’s boyfriend telling her he’s excited about this opportunity for her to experience a new country are juxtaposed with Sophie bored out of her mind and alone. They provide an excellent contrast to the vibrancy that comes when Sophie is around Gloria.
It would be poor writing on my part if I didn’t spend some time talking about how lush Ripe! is. The ocean shimmers, the fruit rinds pop, even the title rips across the screen in a magnificent manner. Is it too soon to say that Ripe! is the best any color has ever looked in the history of film? It can be compared to those viral videos of people with achromatic vision seeing colors for the first time. Ripe! has created a candy wonderland of young love. The 1950s music, the haziness of the film’s grain, and the rich hues all recreate the feelings of that first all-consuming crush. The can’t-eat, can’t-sleep obsessiveness of being young, foolish, and swept up in the inherent romance of connecting with another human being.
Follow me on BlueSky, Instagram, Letterboxd, & YouTube. Check out Movies with My Dad, a new podcast recorded on the car ride home from the movies.