‘The Drama’ Review: Zendaya and Robert Pattinson Circle a Great Idea That Never Fully Lands

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Apr 1

Written By Jonathan P. Moustakas

(L-R) Robert Pattinson, Zendaya **Credit: Courtesy of A24**

A sharp premise and two compelling stars can’t quite sustain a film that mistakes discomfort for depth.

Kristoffer Borgli’s ‘The Drama’ begins with a familiar kind of romantic confidence. Emma and Charlie are the kind of couple that feels already resolved, already complete. They are attractive, self-aware, culturally fluent in that understated, intellectual way that suggests their lives have been carefully curated to appear effortless. When the film opens, they are on the verge of marriage, their future seemingly locked in place, with only the minor logistics of a wedding left to figure out.

That sense of certainty is, of course, the point. Borgli, whose work often explores the unraveling of bourgeois stability, constructs ‘The Drama’ around the idea that even the most seemingly perfect relationships are fragile, waiting for the right fracture point to expose what lies beneath. Here, that fracture arrives in the form of a party game, a deceptively casual prompt that escalates into something far more destabilizing. When Emma reveals the worst thing she has ever done, the film pivots sharply, shifting from romantic dramedy into something more uneasy and psychologically ambiguous.

It is a strong setup, one that promises a deeper excavation of intimacy, trust and the unknowable parts of the people we think we understand. For a moment, the film suggests it might interrogate something genuinely unsettling about the nature of relationships, particularly in a culture where identity is often performed as much as it is lived.

But ‘The Drama’ ultimately resists that depth. What begins as a provocative premise gradually reveals itself to be something far more conventional, a familiar story of pre-wedding doubt dressed up in more unsettling clothing. The revelation itself, initially positioned as a seismic shift, loses its weight as the film unfolds, becoming less a driving force and more a narrative device that the film never fully interrogates.

(L-R) Zendaya, Robert Pattinson **Credit: Courtesy of A24**

Robert Pattinson’s performance is the film’s most consistent anchor. As Charlie, he captures the slow erosion of certainty with a natural, understated precision. His reactions feel grounded, even when the material around him begins to drift. There is a quiet effectiveness in the way Pattinson plays confusion, discomfort and creeping paranoia, making Charlie feel like a character we can project onto even as the film withholds deeper insight into who he actually is.

Zendaya, despite top billing, is given far less to work with. Emma remains elusive, not in a way that feels intentional or thematically rich, but in a way that leaves her underdeveloped. Zendaya brings nuance to the role, carefully modulating Emma’s presence between vulnerability and distance, but the film never allows her to fully exist beyond the framework of its central concept. She is less a character than a catalyst, a figure whose interiority is hinted at but never meaningfully explored.

That imbalance becomes one of the film’s central limitations. ‘The Drama’ positions itself as an examination of a relationship, but it is ultimately more interested in the idea of that relationship than in the people within it. The dynamic between Emma and Charlie is filtered through a conceptual lens that prioritizes structure over substance, leaving the emotional core of the story underdeveloped.

There are moments where the film’s tone briefly aligns with its ambitions. Borgli demonstrates a sharp sense of timing, particularly in scenes that lean into discomfort and social awkwardness. The supporting performances, including Alana Haim and Mamoudou Athie, help ground those moments, offering glimpses of a more fully realized world just outside the film’s immediate focus.

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But the film never fully commits to any one direction. It is not quite a comedy, though it flirts with humor, and not quite a drama, despite its heavier themes. Instead, it exists in a kind of tonal middle ground that gradually becomes less deliberate and more stagnant. After its central reveal, the narrative begins to lose momentum, circling the same emotional territory without deepening it.

What lingers is a sense of missed opportunity. The film gestures toward larger questions about morality, identity and the capacity for violence within otherwise ordinary lives, but it engages with those ideas only superficially. The premise suggests a willingness to confront something uncomfortable, yet the execution remains cautious, retreating into familiar territory just as it approaches something more provocative.

Visually and structurally, ‘The Drama’ is polished. It looks and moves like a film that knows exactly what it wants to be. But that clarity does not extend to its thematic core. Beneath its carefully constructed exterior, there is less substance than the film initially promises.

By the time it reaches its conclusion, ‘The Drama’ feels less like a fully realized exploration of its ideas and more like a well-packaged version of a story we have seen before. The specifics may differ, but the emotional trajectory remains largely unchanged. It is a film that presents itself as something sharper and more incisive than it ultimately is.

The result is not a failure, but it is a disappointment. With its cast and its premise, ‘The Drama’ suggests the possibility of something genuinely memorable. Instead, it settles for something more familiar, leaving behind the sense that it never quite followed through on what made it interesting in the first place.