Twinless poses questions about the durability of friendships

Unlikely couple. If we only had a dime for every time we heard this. When we see two people who differ dramatically in appearance, speech, or even sexual orientation, we tilt our heads as if mentally shifting the duo to the metaphorical misfit category, relegating their relationship to doom. James Sweeney’s Twinless forces us to modify such responses. It’s a story about Roman, a twenty-something man who suddenly loses his twin brother Rocky in a car accident. The film opens with a shot of a colorful commuter train leaving a station. As the train clears out and the camera holds on the empty platform, we hear the screech of a car’s wheels and a terrible impact. Immediately, we know something has gone terribly wrong.

Set in Portland, Twinless stars Dylan O’Brien from the long-running television series Teen Wolf, and James Sweeney, who is also the writer and director of the 2019 film, Straight Up.  A native Idahoan, Roman (O’Brien) is mourning the tragic loss of his identical twin brother, Rocky. When his mother Lisa, played by Lauren Graham of Gilmore Girls, insists that he needs help, he joins a support group for people who have lost twin siblings. The group’s therapist, Charlotte, played by Tasha Smith from Why Did I Get Married and First Wives Club, asks them to introduce themselves by naming a vegetable beginning with the letter of their first name and revealing something they don’t miss about their twin. At this moment, I wonder if the movie is a comedy rather than the heavy drama I surmised from the story’s synopsis. But given the timing soon after Rocky’s funeral, perhaps this was intended to bring some levity to the moment.

Roman meets Dennis (James Sweeney) during a session break, as Dennis makes small jokes and shares that he lost his twin brother Dean. In their mourning, Roman and Dennis forge a bond, attending parties and hockey games together as if standing in for each other’s sibling. Roman and Dennis, though, could not be more different. Roman is heterosexual and Dennis is gay. Roman likes hockey and Dennis craves sandwiches. Roman is fit and goes to the gym regularly, and Dennis, who does not work out, is slim and lanky in appearance. Yet the two become very close.

Roman struggles mightily with Rocky’s loss, as evidenced by him wearing Rocky’s clothes and avoiding everyday tasks. But when he opens the refrigerator to find only a sliced onion and discovers only stale cookies in the cabinet, he calls Dennis to go grocery shopping with him, something the two continue regularly. During a shopping trip, they bump into George, one of Rocky’s friends, who notes that he witnessed the accident and was the last to see him alive. As he clumsily and without invitation shares  that Rocky was distracted by a “crazy guy” who was yelling at him at the time, Roman says he would (to put it mildly) hurt the guy real bad if he found him.

Leaving a hockey game one night, the duo encounter three men, one of whom lobs a gay pejorative at them. Roman confronts him and insists he apologize. When he doesn’t, the four get into a brawl while Dennis watches fearfully but with concern. This brings to mind a scene from the limited series Black Doves, where a gay man, steeled by the gunfire around him, becomes so paralyzed, he has to be physically carried out of danger while he cries and covers his ears.

LGBTQ individuals are often targets of harassment and violence, but such character portrayals can lead to the perpetuation of stereotypes about the group. While most studies in this area focus on partner violence, research out of London found that men who are gay “score higher for empathy and show significantly lower levels of physical aggression than heterosexual men.” This suggests that the former are not likely to engage in physical fighting, even when it means defending themselves against strangers.

I am reminded of Hoon Lee’s portrayal of Job (pronounced Jobe) in the popular television series Banshee, where the LGBTQ character frequently demonstrates the ability to handle bullies with a sharp tongue and with or without weapons. Perhaps the London research attests to the threat response of many gay men. But I wonder if more portrayals of LGBTQ men fighting back or coming to the defense of their friends, can help disrupt stereotypes about the community as passive and thus vulnerable. 

Roman’s altercation with the trio after the hockey game and his expressed desire to exact retribution on the person he views as responsible for Rocky’s death suggest that he is still struggling with Rocky’s loss. He later reveals to Dennis that he regrettably used the same pejorative against Rocky soon after he came out as gay, and that he feels that “drove him” to leave home and settle elsewhere. To provide comfort, Dennis invites Roman to talk to him as if he were Rocky. Roman says through tears, “I don’t know how to be without you.”

Testimonials at the therapy sessions reveal not only the patients’ sense of loss, but also how their pain can be differentiated from the pain that stems from losing a sibling who is not a twin. Roman reveals, for example, that he’s glad he has the pain because otherwise he is “actually alone.” Another notes that twins are “built-in best friends.” As if to drive home this point, in a flashback scene, Rocky describes breaking his toe as a child, and how Roman smashed his own toe so he wouldn’t have to suffer alone. Given this, it is no surprise that Roman defines himself in relation to his brother and struggles to adjust to life without him. 

Roman’s life changes when he meets Marcie (Aisling Franciosi) at a party. As the pair begin spending time together, Dennis becomes resentful and is seen peering at the couple during the party and later sniping at Marcie. A long time co-worker of Dennis’s, Marcie questions the veracity of Dennis’s claims of having a twin brother, leading her then to question his motives for befriending Roman.

There are some great plot twists in this drama that help keep the audience in anticipation of what will unfold in the story. Central to them are what is Dennis’s motivation for lying and what he wants with Roman. These questions are posed by writer James Sweeney, to challenge the notion that friendships built on lies and half-truths, wherever they line up on the compatibility scale, cannot endure.