The ways tragedy impacts human relationships have been explored throughout the entire history of film. Artists and filmmakers have looked at grief, death, pain, and suffering as consistent themes of the human condition, all the while telling stories that we find consolation in.
Ry Russo-Young’s solemn and heart-rending Orphans does just that, offering us a story of two separated sisters coming to terms with what’s left of their family.
The winner of the Special Jury Award in narrative feature competition at the SXSW film festival, Orphans is a potent story from young director Russo-Young. She directs her characters with zeal and yet a sense of distance, allowing the performers to provide flexibility and sincerity for their relationship. Russo-Young utilizes the digital format here, filming the barren wintery settings with ingenuity and lining up her shots with care. It is a good-looking picture, working well off of a small budget.
James Katharine Flynn stars as Sonia, one of two sisters left orphaned after the death of their parents. As we are introduced to her, she is shooting baskets in a gym and is missing every shot she takes. She is wished a “Happy Birthday” by a class full of youngsters and heads off to an isolated farmhouse to spend some time with her sister, Rosie (Lily Wheelwright). Rosie is an artist trying to make ends meet and she is under the impression that she is going to visit her sister for a birthday party.
When Rosie reaches her sister, however, she learns that the party is comprised of the two of them and Sonia has lied about the other guests. Instead, the birthday celebration becomes about Sonia’s attempts at resolution, forming a family dynamic, and seeking company. She is lonesome and longs for a relationship with her distant sister, but the problems between the two of them and the heartache contained in their past threatens to take all that remains.
The performances lie at the core of Orphans. Essentially a two-person play, the film plays out with sequences of discussion, dispute, and passionate diatribes between Rosie and Sonia. Both have skeletons in their closets; Sonia drinks too much and Rosie pops pills. Their attempts at coming together are often stalled by unalterable tensions, perhaps born from the death of their parents or perhaps born before then. There are moments of stillness, too, and a beautifully shot sequence of the two characters dancing with one another that quickly becomes a physical altercation.
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