Pratfall (2024) Movie Review: An Incredible Joshua Burge elevates this existential Before-series riff set in the heart of New York

From Martin Scorsese to Woody Allen, filmmakers have been fascinated by New York for a plethora of reasons. The city has such an undeniable charm that someone like me living thousands and thousands of miles away from it is pulled towards its magnetic current. However, while most filmmakers have often romanticized the city, filmmaker Alex Andre whose debut feature “Pratfall” is set almost entirely on the city’s many conjoining streets has different plans altogether. While he does romanticize the city to an extent, he also carefully administers the darkness that the isolation of being in the maximum city brings to its many lonely citizens.

When we first meet Eli (Joshua Burge) he feels like a self-talking, deeply troubled middle-aged man who has developed an entirely distinct personality from his own; someone who is constantly bringing him down and pushing him towards a kind of hopelessness about simply living in this world. That is until he stumbled onto Joelle (Chloé Groussard). A French tourist who is so lost by the blinding expanse of the big city that despite Eli’s hostility, she kinda sticks around him. What follows is a charming meet-cute where Eli is forced to shed off some of his hard exterior, and Joelle is finally able to see the side of New York City that doesn’t feel all that isolating and hopeless.

Of course, both characters are troubled by traumas that have brought them to this crossroad where they met each other but director Alex Andre is more eager to capture their present than be too dependent on where they come from. We do get to know that Eli has gone through a devastating loss and Joelle also feels like an outcast who just wanted some freedom from whatever life she had back in her country. However, Andre doesn’t allow us to define them by their situations. So, what we get instead is a slow burn that slowly pivots away from nihilism to a more distinct, free-flowing Before-series-esque meet-cute that becomes more and more captivating as the two people at its center overdose on coffee and hot dogs.

The film works mainly because of the chemistry that Joshua Burge and Chloé Groussard have. The language barrier doesn’t affect the connection that is built through the narrative which is essentially a dozen conversations that seemingly weave into each other despite originating from different ends. Burge’s performance is so good that you are bound to be captivated by his big, distressed eyes that speak even when words are not spoken. He single-handedly elevates this debut feature that uses a hand-held camera (operated by director Alex Andre), and a makeshift script that must have had a lot of improvisations pulled in.

“Existence is suffering,” says Eli somewhere in the second act of the film but by the time that moment comes, you’ve been with Eli for some time and know why he would say something like that. However, nothing prepares you for the dark turn the film takes, despite giving us multiple hints about how the meet-cute may or may not be a red hearing. As a viewer, your liking of the film might depend on your appetite to allow reality to take its course, but no matter where you come from this fall on your ass will definitely hurt.