On January 10, 2024, with a streaming release on January 24, 2024, Buffalo 8 releases 'Disfluency', which has earned rave reviews from critics at the time of this writing and a score of 100% on
Rotten Tomatoes. In the film, "After flunking her final college class, Jane retreats to her Michigan hometown for one last, carefree summer vacation. She soon rekindles an old friendship with a single mother, teaching her sign language so she can reconnect with her son. Despite her best efforts, however, Jane can't hide the traumatic secret that caused her academic failure." The ensemble cast includes
Libe Barer, Ariela Barer, Chelsea Alden, Dylan Arnold, and
Travis Tope. Read the full review round-up below.
Rob Aldam of
Backseat Mafia says, "While the term post-traumatic stress disorder might have first been officially used in the late 1970s for the diagnosis of Vietnam War veterans, the concept of an extreme stress reaction predates it by a couple of decades. Of course, the actual symptoms of PTSD were nothing new, though the condition has been known by a variety of names over the centuries. There’s no doubting its connection with warfare, but also any form of severe interpersonal violence. One young woman struggles to process what happened to her in Disfluency. Jane (Libe Barer), the prodigal daughter, returns suddenly to her parents’ lake house after unexpectedly flunking her final college class. Her mother (Diana DeLaCruz) is beside herself that her youngest has ruined her prospects, although her father (Ricky Wayne) is a little more upbeat. She returns to her hometown and finds consolation in her older sister (Ariela Barer), high school friends and crush (Dylan Arnold) for the long hot summer. Trying to process what has happened to her. On the face of it, the premise of Disfluency might not sound particularly original, but the way the drama unravels in writer/director
Anna Baumgarten’s debut feature is brilliantly done. This is largely thanks to some great writing and a wonderful central performance from Libe Barer. The use of language, especially speech disfluency, as a way of conveying how Jane is feeling works exceedingly well. While the luscious cinematography captures the hazy days of youth. All helping to make Disfluency a hugely empathetic, emotive and rewarding experience."
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| Photo by Edgar Soto on Unsplash |
Brian Eggert of
Deep Focus Review notes, "Director Anna Baumgarten’s Disfluency uses a linguistic term as a metaphor for our sometimes delayed response to trauma and how that can upset the course of our lives. The title refers to vocalized pauses such as “um” and “like” that so many of us involuntarily use as interrupters to our thought flow. “I’m sorry” is the term of choice for Jane (Libe Barer), a talented student who nonetheless just flunked her final undergraduate course—about disfluency, of course. After returning home to Michigan for the summer, Jane says “I’m sorry” as a reflex, and in turn, buries the reasons why she flunked. But with the help of some hometown friends and her sister Lacey, played by Libe’s real-life sibling Ariela Barer, Jane works up the confidence to tell people what happened. Disfluency comes with a content warning that some viewers may find its themes difficult. Indeed, Jane confronts her repressed trauma with the suspicion that she may have been raped at a college party. Libe is particularly good in her scenes of teary recollection during an anxiety-ridden trip to the police station with her sister. And the off-screen relationship between the siblings helps give the sisters’ on-screen dynamic a naturalness—the best parts of the film are the scenes between them. However, the film’s dramaturgy and generic form resemble a production suited for a Lifetime Original movie or even a movie-of-the-week circa 1995. But that shouldn’t be held against it. Even if Disfluency feels maudlin and commonplace in its execution, the Barers sell every emotion in their performances, making the result undeniably effective. 3/4 Stars."
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