30/05/2022 - CANNES 2022: Twin sisters need no words in Agnieszka Smoczyńska’s touching, odd heartbreaker of a movie, based on a true story

Cinema loves twins. There is something profoundly disturbing about their love and connection, about their identical, baby-blue dresses, just like the ones in The Shining, and about the kind of understanding that really doesn’t need words. Polish director Agnieszka Smoczyńska knows this, but she still goes beyond the obvious in The Silent Twins [+see also:
interview: Agnieszka Smoczynska
film profile], a twisted, sad tale of two black sisters who didn’t like the world around them too much, so they created their own.

Shown in Cannes’ Un Certain Regard, yet sadly walking away empty-handed, it’s one of the few examples when a promising filmmaker moves onto bigger things while somehow regaining control and, most importantly, their own personality. Smoczyńska, now making her English-language debut, thrilled audiences with her singing mermaid curio The Lure [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Agnieszka Smoczyńska
film profile], then opted for something more muted with Fugue [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Agnieszka Smoczyńska
film profile]. This film, starring Black Panther’s Letitia Wright and Tamara Lawrance, feels like a combination of the two, of the craziness and the heartbreak. And a successful one, too.

That this all fits Smoczyńska’s style and sensibility so well is surprising – mostly because it’s actually a true story. June and Jennifer Gibbons were real: they grew up in Wales, and at one point in their life, they stopped talking. Their immigrant parents were left confused (“Nothing bad happened!” their mother explains here) but mostly just let them be. Until the girls decided to leave their room and gain life experiences, as some disappointing sexual encounters and acts of vandalism later, they were deemed unstable and sent off to a mental hospital. As reported by Marjorie Wallace, who later wrote a book about their story, they stayed there for 11 years.

There is a quirkiness to this tale, with bouts of cruel imagination as the sisters go about their initial plan – more than anything else, they want to become published writers. So far, so Brontë. The tales they create and share with each other come alive, and in style – with stop-motion animation and musical sequences, filled with joy and panache. They see all this, but nobody else can. When they are alone, they are chattier than Robin Williams in Good Morning, Vietnam – they even pretend to have their own radio show when they are little. There is warmth in their world, but it gets cold once they step outside. Then, they are just two black girls. Sad, isolated and stubbornly silent.

What’s interesting is that while it’s a very specific story, trying its best to access their intimate thoughts, there are some bigger subjects at play. It may have to do with race or gender, but once again, someone is hidden away. Discarded, even. These girls, they don’t belong, and they are not even trying to – of course it’s rubbing people the wrong way. Their sensibility and imagination aren’t valued; it’s seen as psychosis. Smoczyńska has been mentioning French sculptor Camille Claudel, also confined to an asylum against her will. The ghost of a “mad woman”, one who is too different and maybe too free to be left in peace, looms after watching this film, demanding attention and perhaps even justice.

Smoczyńska implies what it was like for the Gibbons sisters and that the company they found in each other was necessary at times. But something went wrong, and it’s hard to say when – by the time others try to separate them, it’s already too late. You can’t just rip off somebody’s limb and expect them to walk without stumbling.

Toxic relationships can be different, and clearly, it’s possible to have one with a sister. And yet Smoczyńska’s characters are not to be pitied; they are to be rediscovered, their talents stored away as deep as their voices. It’s a weird movie, going from arthouse to genre and back, and one that proves that Smoczyńska can bring something new to the table: emotion, sure, but also whimsy and playfulness. “You are good with tension,” says a journalist here to one of the sisters. So is this director.

The Silent Twins was produced by Poland’s Madants, the UK’s 42and the USA’s Kindred Spirit. Its international sales are handled by Focus Features.