Mistakes made in the past often come back to haunt those who made them. Writer/director Samuel Edelsack’s You Still Can applies this concoction of regret and failure to Travis (Mike Provenzano) and Julia (Nina Andjelic), a distant father and his troubled daughter, as they reconnect one fateful afternoon.
A film’s message can be the ultimate dealbreaker, and if judged solely on that merit, You Still Can scores rather respectably. Well shot by Director of Photography Brad Forman, with some great color grading to match the somber mood, it’s a short that’s engineered to start discussions about healing and introspection when all seems lost in a person’s life. Edelsack is no stranger to bringing characters to these kinds of crossroads, but that venture yields some mixed results this time around.
For starters, there’s a severe lack of urgency in the way Travis and Julia interact from the get-go. Julia’s attempt on her own life is a stirring sequence, where Travis happens upon his estranged daughter just as she’s about to press the serrated metal into her arm. He looks at Julia, shaking his head with indifference and disappointment. This is the first moment where you feel something missing from the film, and that is its emotional direction. Any father, estranged or not, would have been horrified by what could have happened had they not intervened in time, but Provenzano’s performance errs on a more nonchalant angle that just doesn’t connect. Perhaps this was to further drive home Travis’ borderline dismissive attitude, but the film inexplicably maintains that cadence all the way to the finish line. Edelsack’s screenplay is also muddled, confining the duo to a car interior for a story that frequently feels like a family therapy edition of Twenty Questions.
Travis asks an exposition-laced question, and Julia then answers in similarly exposition-heavy segments before the cycle repeats for another few rounds. The film settles into this beat-for-beat formula that not only mutes the acting but also the grounded nature of the plot as well—none of it feels natural. Any goodwill you as the viewer feel for the two leads is purely instilled through baseline empathy, as neither Julia nor Travis express themselves enough to endear their plight to the audience. Their voices, faces, and proximity to each other remain the exact same throughout the 8-minute runtime—stilted and repetitive, even with Andjelic’s strides to elevate the material by transitioning Julia between more complex state’s of mind. If there was a more concerted effort to bring them closer by heightening the tension or the stakes, it could have made the ultimate difference.
You’ll likely end up resonating with the idea of You Still Can more than its actual execution, as missed opportunities with both the script and performances leave it stagnating from its very inception.
