Sundance Film Festival 2024 Review – Emo-horror auteur Jane Schoenbrun delivers another moody journey with the new slow-burn head-scratcher I Saw the TV Glow. Here Schoenbrun explores themes of social alienation, dysphoria, and the burdens of social expectation through the lens of wistful 90’s nostalgia. We follow the years-long friendship between Owen and Maddy who meet at the beginning of high school and subsequently take two very different, often disturbing paths. While beautifully crafted and nuanced with meaning, Glow seems far more interested with lingering in a mood than saying what it means.

We first meet Owen as he attends a school function with his Mother (Danielle Deadwyler). Wandering off, the sheltered Owen quickly finds his tribe by meeting loner Maddy. The two bond over a popular young adult series known as The Pink Opaque. While Maddy is openly obsessed with the series, Owen lives a militantly sheltered life and has only ever heard of the show. Lying to his mom about sleeping over at a friend’s place, Owen spends the night at Maddy’s place and joins her and a friend to watch an episode of the show. We soon learn that Maddy’s home life, while a lot more liberal, is far from happy. She promises that one day she will leave town and never come back.

The story jumps ahead when Maddy begins secretly delivering VHS tapes of The Pink Opaque to Owen. After a few years of silence, the two reconnect. Maddy (Brigette Lundy-Paine) confesses that she likes girls while Owen (Justice Smith) maintains that he feels nothing like that for anyone boy or girl. Schoenbrun deftly moves along in time highlighting the moments of connection between Maddy and Owen, while fully establishing their otherness. Then one day, Maddy does disappear.

Sporting more of a story than their breakout We’re All Going to the World’s Fair, Schoenbrun‘s Glow draws the connection between fandom and queerness, mutual trauma, and the paths we take to survive. Owen chooses the path of least resistance while Maddy defiantly lives her life as she must. The pink-tinted Twilight Zone the film exists in might have been enough to drive home the point and I really wanted to see things play out there. Instead we get long moments of mystery and several unnecessary flashbacks that only confuse more than they clarify.

I Saw the TV Glow is a beautiful film to look at with powerful performances from leads. Lundy-Paine gives us wonderfully unhinged obsession and intensity as Maddy while Smith serves the exact opposite as the frail, obsequious Owen. Their chemistry is on point and the two nail it.

This is the natural evolution of a filmmaker with a distinct and powerful vision, no question. Here though, Schoenbrun can’t seem to decide on how to say what they need to say so we either get tangent or tone. There are either long stretches of mood or abrupt additions that don’t quite seem to fit. I was far more fascinated with observing the evolution of an artist than I was with the movie itself.

6 Out of 10