Tristan and Isaac
2020 · 13m · USA
Directed by Michaela Myers
Tones: melancholic, sensual, tender
A woman named Tristan has a chance encounter with a man named Isaac, and the two fall deeply and passionately in love — but their connection must reckon with an unavoidable reality. Loosely inspired by the classical love tragedy of Tristan and Isolde.
Picked by Margot
The scouts
Gender-flipping a medieval legend is exactly the kind of move that *sounds* subversive until you realize the film's actually in love with the source material—and that contradiction, that earnestness about myth, is what makes it quietly interesting rather than provocative.
Myers situates herself deliberately in the Tristan lineage while interrogating it through gender, and the 16mm stock becomes formal argument—a sensuous, grain-heavy insistence on bodies and duration that recalls both classical cinema and contemporary essayistic practice.
The specific choice here is restraint: where a smaller budget might force melodrama, Myers lets the 16mm texture and the space between her actors do the emotional work, and that decision transforms what could be sentimental into something achingly precise.
Reviews
Captured with sensuous cinematography on textured 16mm film, the performances between actors Myers and Andrew Bowen capture the mutual passion between Tristan and Isaac, with their scenes together possessing both tenderness and desire.
Admirable constructed story, good acting and intense passion reflected in gentle manner.
Festivals
- Sherman Oaks Film Festival 2020