Dear Zoe doesn’t shy away from difficult topics, especially surrounding tragedy. We see that from the very opening scene, where we see two tragedies happening simultaneously: The death of young Zoe, the character in which the film is named, and the tragedy of 9/11. The film dives in headfirst without much context, and we are expected to learn along the way. Coupling this opening cinematic is a monologue voice over from Tess (Sadie Sink), which I think works well, as it is implied to be a letter she is writing to Zoe.
Tess is struggling with her young sister’s death, and both her family life and personal life have been torn apart. Tess lives with her mother Elly (Jessica Capshaw), Stepfather David (Justin Bartha) and youngest sister Emily (Vivien Lyra Blair). Their family life is rough, to say the least. It seems like no one really is able to cope well with Zoe’s loss. This culminates in Tess deciding to run off to the home of her father Nick (Theo Rossi), a slacker type of father figure who doesn’t work, sells drugs to get by, and has never had to parent before. One thing is completely evident from the moment we meet Nick: He loves Tess. He’d do anything for her and that makes him very charming and likable even through his shortcomings as a father. It’s also here we meet Jimmy, the next-door neighbor who Tess takes a liking to. As the story evolves, we get to see Tess work through trauma like we could expect anyone would, and the film is full of ups and downs as we would expect.
The journey we see Tess take works well for a few reasons. First, it cannot be understated how good Sadie Sink is in her first real lead role. The movie was filmed all the way back in 2019, when Sink was 17 herself, and she proves her powerhouse acting chops even then. Her character felt nuanced, real, and relatable, and throughout the film we could see how the trauma is affecting her even when facing happy moments. Her dialogue delivery is great, and there isn’t one time where I feel like I am watching an actor. Sink rocks, and this movie continues to prove it. It makes me even more excited to see her in Darren Aronofsky’s The Whale, which sees it’s wide release later in 2022.
Beyond Sink, I also really appreciated the performances of the characters around her. Theo Rossi and Kweku Collins I feel really delivered great performances here too. I really believed the relationships we saw between Tess and her father and especially between Tess and Jimmy. They delivered on a sweet narrative of unlikely love and I’m glad they made the characters work. Vivian Lyra Blair also proved to be a true up and coming star, and in the limited time we got to see her act, it was extremely well done, and she gave a performance with more emotion than people would give someone triple her age. Seriously, take note of the scene with her and Sink at the playground at school, and tell me she isn’t amazing. I also want to mention one small detail that I always enjoy in films about teens: These characters are dressed like how teens would dress in the early 2000s. It helped ground the film and made it more believable. I honestly don’t think I would have enjoyed it nearly as much if we saw characters dressed like how they would in Euphoria, and that’s a detail I enjoy.
I also really liked the tone of Dear Zoe. While the whole idea of the plot is deeply rooted in tragedy, it’s not a sob story type movie. We see clear shifts in tone, and we see how not all moments are sad. We get real, genuine, happy moments for the main characters, and I liked that a lot. However, this movie really shines when it plays into our emotions. Between scenes of parents fighting, to PTSD-like flashbacks and dissociation from reality, this film does perform well. The duality of tones works incredibly well and feels extremely believable. It all leads the viewer to form genuine connections with the main characters, and especially Tess, and so when we get to learn the real circumstances around Zoe’s death, it hurts the soul badly, and it works so well.
The one big issue I had with the movie, and I guess it plays into the source material as well, is that it uses the 9/11 tragedy as a plot device. The story doesn’t need it to be just as compelling, and I know the source material uses it to drive the story, but it really wasn’t necessary. I would have enjoyed the movie just as much without that plot device, and to be frank, it really doesn’t do anything except ground us in the time period. In an era where we don’t need to be 100% faithful to the source material to still tell a good story (see Jojo Rabbit or Children of Men), that detail should have been left on the cutting room floor. Also, being based on a young adult novel, we see so much detail about what effect the accident has on Tess, but not nearly enough on what it does to the parents, which is equally as tragic a tale. I feel with some reworking there, the writers could have added some more scenes or dialogue to what we already had and been able to be more compelling on that side of things while still keeping the movie under 2 hours. I did also feel that the film had a tough time finding itself and its tone in the first 20 minutes, but it settled in once we reached Nick’s house.
Final Thoughts
This movie interrelated the tones perfectly in my opinion. And in the end, it’s not about having a happy ending, it’s about learning to move on, to live with emotion, and to heal in time. My favorite quote from the film really sums it up: “[It’s] A story about before, and after. Before you were born, and after. Before you left us far too soon, and after. Before I ran away to my dad’s, and after. Before I was ready to get better, and after.” That’s extremely powerful and rings true to anyone working through the healing process after tragedy. It’s not about forgetting, it’s not about regret, it’s not even about moving on. All it is, is before and after. Dear Zoe shows that to us, and we shouldn’t forget it.
