SXSW ’26: “Their Town” is Teenage “Before Sunrise” Magic
This review was originally published on Film Obsessive.
For teenagers, the high school play might as well be the newest show to debut on Broadway. In Katie Aselton’s SXSW-premiering film, Their Town, the play is the fragile glue that holds this small group of characters together. The audience will never see the play, but we’re told there’s at least one scene that takes place in a cemetery. The actual play isn’t the purpose of Their Town, though, at least not in its final form. It’s about the creation of art, those who are responsible for it, and how that can lead to the rare, beautiful, lightning-in-a-bottle life experience of finding someone who sees you in the way you wish you saw yourself.
The high school play is upon Abby (Ora Duplass). She was cast in one of the lead roles and her boyfriend, Tyler (William Atticus Parker), was the other lead until a few hours ago. He has decided, one week before opening night, that he’s no longer going to participate. Tyler encourages Abby to stick with it because she needs to bolster her resume so she can “follow” him to the college he’s decided on. In his place, by choice of the drama teacher (Jeffery Self), is the quiet kid, Matt (Chosen Jacobs), who signed up just to paint sets and is intimidated by the prospect of acting. Abby offers to help him get up to speed and the two spend their night wandering around town.
The comparisons between Their Town and the Before Trilogy are welcomed by Aselton, who cited the trilogy as a reference for her, screenwriter/husband Mark Duplass, and Ora. Their Town takes place in Bangor, Maine, not a European country. While Abby and Matt are essentially strangers, they’re not as foreign to each other as Céline and Jesse. This difference makes Their Town richer in a way. Because of their shared town and history and the common goal of the play, the film feels like a combination of Before Sunrise and Before Sunset. It allows for a different type of connection that’s colored by the past and cognizant of the present, but also a little unconcerned with and utterly consumed by the future. The basis of contradictions on which the teenage years subsist.
Credit: Sarah Whelden
The ending of Their Town is a sight to behold. It’s a few lines of dialogue, a slow-moving dolly push, and two characters looking at each other. Nothing more, nothing less, yet it’s shattering in a deeply human way. In theory, we look at someone every single day, but there are moments in life where looking at someone is deeper than that. It’s intimate in a way that’s uncomfortable, because how easy is it to break that eye contact? To escape that intensity of connection in its barest form. It makes sense that this is where Their Town ends, because that’s the film’s whole thesis. It’s about being seen past the personas we create and the walls we build to the ugly, pulpy, sweetness underneath.
Sarah Whelden’s camera work adds a beautiful layer of intimacy to the bond these characters are creating. Things are a little hazy at the beginning of the night when the two are sharing laughs, a levity that comes from being around someone so different from those you spend most of your days with. Then, as the weightiness of the world rears its ugly head, images are crisper, but the camera remains unsteady. A scene that takes place on a playground swingset with a handheld camera is breathtaking in its shaky, yet fluid ability to capture the intense emotions these teens have been afraid to say aloud.
“I know you,” Abby emphatically tells Matt. It’s not that she knows in that she can tell you his name, where he lives, or what he likes. It’s that she knows him in a more sensitive, intuitive way. Their Town isn’t building toward a teen romance ending where all of their problems have been solved over the course of one night, but instead ends with this sentiment of acknowledgement. In recognizing that everyone has hardships they’re going through, but that those weights don’t mean they’re not worthy of love and companionship. Their Town is an affirmation of existence for all of us, no matter what age.
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