film
Silent Twins
directed by Agnieszka Smoczyńska, Poland / UK / USA 2022, 113' (English friendly)
- Awarded the Golden Lions for Best Film at the Polish Film Festival in Gdynia and premiered at the Cannes Film Festival in the Un Certain Regard section, Silent Twins is the latest film by Agnieszka Smoczyńska, author of The Lure and Fugue. One of Poland’s most original directors talks about the wild and untamed parts of us with the lightness of dance steps, and in her English-language debut she also demonstrates her unfettered imagination. The visionary, music-laden Silent Twins, although based on a book by Marjorie Wallace, bears the unmistakable stamp of Smoczyńska’s style and – like her previous films – shows the female perspective.
- June and Jennifer Gibbons, twins from Wales, at one point stop communicating with the world. The ‘silent twins’ escape from the bleak countryside – with not much more to offer black girls than humiliation – into neon-coloured fantasies of literary fame, romantic love and pools full of Pepsi. But the girls’ hormone-fuelled teenage imagination also has a dark side, as does their bond marked with rivalry.
- In creating the twins’ inner world on screen, Agnieszka Smoczyńska draws heavily on the aesthetics of old advertisements, colour magazines and soap operas. She reaches for thriller and sensual musical, drama and stop-motion animation. But this cinematic emotional bomb also owes its energy to Letitia Wright (Black Panther, Black Mirror series) and Tamara Lawrance (Little Axe series). They have created poignant characters of girls who cannot live without each other or together, and whose teenage rebellion spirals out of control. Smoczyńska’s film can be read as a study of toxic relationship, artistic genius and female rebellion.
