Shadows on the Wall

Ponyboi

dir Esteban Arango
scr River Gallo
prd Mark Ankner, River Gallo, Trevor Wall, Adel Future Nur
with River Gallo, Dylan O'Brien, Victoria Pedretti, Murray Bartlett, Indya Moore, Juan Carlos Hernandez, Annie Henk, Miles Coreas, Keith William Richards, Stephen Moscatello, Jari Jones, NaTonia Monet
release UK Mar.25 flare,
US 27.Jun.25
24/US 1h43

SUNDANCE FILM FEST

See also the 2019 short:

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Set on the rough streets of New Jersey, this drama follows an intersex sex worker through a frightening odyssey. While the film works better as a drama than a thriller, the topicality is compelling, as is the charisma of writer-actor River Gallo, who adapted this from their 2019 short. The film is a swirl of action beats with internalised emotional resonance, and the result is inventive and involving.

Selling sex at night, Ponyboi (Gallo) works days in a laundromat with best pal Angel (Pedretti). She's expecting a baby with Vinny (O'Brien), a drug dealer who's also secretly sleeping with, and pimping out, Ponyboi. One day, Ponyboi's mother (Henk) calls to say their father (Hernandez) is dying, asking them to come home seven years after being thrown out. But Ponyboi has to go on the run after a trick goes wrong, pursued by Vinny and a local gangster (Richards). Maybe their dream man, cowboy Bruce (Bartlett), will rescue them and take them to Vegas.

Flashbacks reveal details of Ponyboi's childhood, as their parents subjected them to surgery and ongoing hormone therapy to increase their masculinity. On this fateful day, violent events bring back this trauma. This plays out in ways that are somewhat overwrought, as the mob movie beats detract from the more important personal drama. It's moving to see people mistake Ponyboi for a trans woman or a femme boy. And everything in their life is transactional.

Gallo is hugely engaging as a vulnerable young person simply trying to find their place in the world. So getting caught up in a mess involving drugs and sex feels earth-shattering. By contrast, the acceptance they get from the superb Bartlett's open-handed Bruce is lovely. O'Brien also goes deep as the amoral Vinny, a fast-talking thug who could charm anyone. And Pedretti brings her own fierce energy as a woman who won't be shut down by anyone.

Throughout their life, Ponyboi has been told that taking testosterone is essential. No one ever offered another option; they never thought they could be happy living the way they were born. As a friend says, it's not the hormones that make Ponyboi who they are. In the end, these events push Ponyboi to make some big decisions about their future. So while the story resolves in a few expected ways, the final scenes offer a complex mix of connection and hopefulness that makes the film both urgent and essential.

themes, language, violence, sexuality 20.Jun.25

R E A D E R R E V I E W S

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