TYREL Review
One of the worst feelings in the world is feeling alone. Whether we are alone physically or in our own minds or through singular experiences, feeling like the only person in the room for one reason or another is less than fun times. For Tyler (Jason Mitchell), he finds himself amidst a group of strangers, where even then a once idyll sounding weekend getaway with some dudes devolves into a fusion of days filled with self-doubt, microaggressions, and at its core, pure loneliness.
Another on-the-ground, in the dirt film from Sebastian Silva (who wrote and directed), TYREL offers up a naturalistic and increasingly disquieting look at a group of men running wild among one another. As it goes, Tyler from the very first scene seems uncomfortable with his current predicament: from what we learn, Tyler is a restaurant owner looking to get away with his friend Johnny (Christopher Abbott) from the troubles of his life back in the city, with his girlfriend’s sickly family currently occupying the space. As he reasons to himself, what better way to get some rest from that situation by going to Pete’s (played by the always uncomforting Caleb Landry Jones) cabin-side birthday party for the weekend? As Tyler meets more of Johnny and Pete’s friends (played by the likes of Trust Arancio, Nicolas Arze, Max Born, Roddy Bottum, Michael Cera, Philip Ettinger and Michael Zegen) and the weekend festivities begin to kick in, Tyler, finding himself to be the only black man of the group, slowly becomes ensnared in a long weekend of microaggressions and alienation.
At once small and large, TYREL has some interesting topics it wants to tackle, particularly those of race relations and toxic male tendencies making the setting of eight dudes partying in an isolated and wintry cabin a rather intriguing microcosmic abode. However, for better or worse Silva crafts a film that only fleetingly touches on these topics, at least on a surface level watch making the end result feel like watching eight dudes dick around over a weekend for 90 minutes or so. While the director/writer has a good handle on getting actors to behave naturally around one another, capturing the hectic dialogue of vulgar jokes and hushed suspicions found in any random house party, Silva never really lets his ideas simmer, moving from one scene to the next in abrupt fashion. To note, as of writing this I will admit that some of the subtext in the film may be going over my head especially in regards to Tyler’s role as the only black man of the group as he begins a slow descent into aggression and paranoia brought on by the feeling that he doesn’t belong with Johnny and his friends. As it is, what sets off these thoughts in our main character arises in various little microaggressions that range from mispronunciations of his name (hence the title of the film) to racist room games focused on stereotypical accents. True, despite the film framing it as a descent into some kind of alienated sense of madness (as maybe Tyler IS overreacting to little jokes here and there), Silva and his main character and the film itself slowly divulge that even the smallest (and maybe-maybe-not intentional) jokes can create clawing feelings of negative otherness within people, pushing them into a corner of standoffishness or aggression.
For Tyler, as a Black man in a room full of white people (granted, there is a Latin character, Nico, involved in the friend group too) preconceived ideas may already be against him from the jump, unnervingly setting up the film to be a tragedy about a man becoming what the world already thinks of him. In spite of this intriguing throughline of the film, TYREL, for better or worse, never gets too dramatic with things pushing these daunting ideas and thoughts along as the boys continue on with their festivities. This leads to a film that feels more empty than it actually is as Silva’s approach to this story is all grit and realism rather than any showy confrontations or conflicts. By the time the film wraps up, TYREL feels like watching an everyday event being filmed in the way that lacks importance which ironically only adds to the film’s lingering disturbingness.
As it goes, the film moves slowly, letting its conflicts appear ever so slowly as Silva heartily captures his characters with anti-flashy shots evoking the mood and look of a home video. As a result, the film can feel like a drag overall at points, especially if one finds his characters to be rather unpleasant (or annoying) to be around which is moreso a testament to most of the performers as each character feels like a real person, faults and all. Indeed, the headlining Mitchell does most of the subtle heavy lifting, using his eyes and body language to perfectly capture someone trapped in an uncomfortable environment.
In the end, Mr. Silva’s TYREL marks another entry from the filmmaker that boasts highly intriguing themes and situations rendered moot by an overall lackadaisical pace and feel. While the audience gets a front seat to one man’s hellish long weekend, many viewers will probably feel like Tyler at the end of it all: over it and ready to get back home.
2.5/5
