In I Saw the TV Glow, the light referenced in the title permeates the movie in the oddest, most unsettling of ways. It seeps from television sets, of course—especially in an early image of a boy sitting transfixed before a screen in an otherwise dark room. But many other things strangely glow: the chalk drawings on a suburban street; an ice-cream truck; the produce display case at a supermarket; a basement fish tank. It’s as if TV has taken over reality and cast it in a sickly pall.
Writer-director Jane Schoenbrun’s follow-up to their feature debut, 2022’s We’re All Going to the World’s Fair, I Saw the TV Glow is another portrait of suburban loneliness and estrangement, as mediated by popular culture. In World’s Fair, an isolated girl becomes transfixed by an online horror game; here, two teens—a middle-school boy and a high-school girl—form an unlikely bond over the deep lore of a cheapo sci-fi series called The Pink Opaque. Eventually, reality and TV begin to blur for them both—in ways beyond that omnipresent glow.
As the kids, Justice Smith and Brigette Lundy-Paine offer aching variations on this disassociated state. Smith’s Owen walks through life as if he’s stunned to find himself there; he experiences everything from his father (a looming Fred Durst) to the halls of school through a haze. Lundy-Paine’s Maddy is more proactive about her angst, speaking in bursts of angry certainty, especially when it comes to anything associated with The Pink Opaque. In that show—amusing clips of which Schoenbrun sprinkles throughout I Saw the TV Glow—they find escape and a source of identity, even as sexuality and gender seem to be somewhat open questions for both. (When Maddy clarifies to Owen that she is attracted to girls, then asks if he likes girls, he responds: “I . . . I think that . . . I like TV shows.”)
Working with cinematographer Eric Yue, Schoenbrun has upped their visual acuity even beyond the arresting imagery of World’s Fair—not only in the lighting, but also in the disconcerting compositions: a head thrust into a TV set, the body leaning forward in a way that suggests a form of worship; a constellation-projection system casting stars across a face; a chest cut open to reveal a screen inside. There’s a newly visceral quality, a rawness, to I Saw the TV Glow that makes it feel particularly alive.
And yet, the movie is also suffocating. Without giving away any details, it’s safe to say that The Pink Opaque functions as less of a savior for Owen and Maddy and more of a temporary salve. I Saw the TV Glow, however, might be something more substantial. While pop culture will never replace our need for genuine connection—for a relationship that both gives and receives—a movie like this, with a welcoming weirdness that communicates in a subliminal way, offers sustenance to anyone who has felt misunderstood, ostracized, and unsure of themselves. Even amidst the movie’s horror, there’s a glow here that feels warm.
(5/19/2024)
