A Sundance hit so enticing that its star’s stans got the film pulled from the festival’s online platform after it was repeatedly pirated for clout on social media, Twinless does indeed offer a hilarious, affecting, range-proving dual performance from Dylan O’Brien that’s worth the criminal hype. Befitting the dark small-scale comedy’s title, O’Brien plays both gay hotshot Rocky and his straight dimwit brother Roman—that is, until Rocky gets annihilated early on by a passing truck. But this narrative rug-pull isn’t the last or largest in James Sweeney’s ridiculous film, which twists its initial coping comedy premise into catty erotica just clever enough to pull off its sillier ideas.
But Twinless isn’t just a hyper-specific joke about “boyfriend twins” spinning out into madness. Rather, that’s just one small punchline caught in the avalanche of its snowballing plot, which begins innocuously enough with Roman heading to a support group for those who’ve lost twins. It’s there, at this meeting ripped from a night at the improv, where the stressed and unmoored lunk runs into Denis (Sweeney), who reminds him of his brother and offers him a surrogate second half. Denis reminds Roman of Rocky not because he’s gay and bitchy (though he is both of those things), but because he’s sharp, witty, and confident enough to go after what he wants in life. Without his other (and, he worries, better) half, Roman isn’t just adrift, but totally lost.
It’s through this stunted confusion that O’Brien becomes the selling point of this charming, low-key film. His understated turn as Roman balances out his scenery-gobbling costars and provides some gut laughs as his oblivious schlub hits rock bottom. Roman devolves into a prototypically basic man-child when detached from his late twin, all grey sweatpants and video games and takeout, which Denis sees as an opening to get in with the malapropistic, sometimes caveman-like bro. Like Roman’s “any port in a storm” attitude, Denis’ affection for his support group compatriot isn’t entirely compromised by ulterior motives, but a complex internal debate rages beneath every calculated move made on his end of the relationship.
This is where Sweeney—who injects his sophomore directing effort with some amusing visual gags, charmingly coordinated costumes, and shot designs far more thoughtful than your run-of-the-mill comedy—struggles as a performer. While the multihyphenate can zip through a long, writerly monologue with the practiced nuance of the person who wrote said monologue, hitting all the beats and turns needed to steer listeners along the path he’s carved, he can seem a bit lost when not delivering snippy zingers. The problem is he’s written himself a plot juicy enough to ask a lot more than he’s able to give. Surrounding himself with O’Brien and Aisling Franciosi (endearingly cheery as Roman’s crush) only emphasizes the gulf between them during the film’s more earnest moments.
That heart, though, is an essential counterweight to the zanier elements of the story, which verges on viral Cut article territory in terms of sheer messiness and confident stupidity. As its characters make bad choices, some foolish, some perverse, and some truly Machiavellian, Twinless sticks with the absurd emotional catastrophe that follows. That dedication to the mess it’s made is often captivating, even when the film’s intentional line-blurring between comedy, romance, and gaslighting thriller never reaches the heights of its twin-centric sources of inspiration, like Brian De Palma. But it’s both impressive and enjoyable that in his second film, Sweeney displays enough depth beneath his jokes to provide his characters and tones with their own foils. Even the subgenres encased within Twinless seem to banter with each other in a winning double act.
Director: James Sweeney
Writer: James Sweeney
Starring: Dylan O’Brien, James Sweeney, Aisling Franciosi, Lauren Graham, Tasha Smith, Chris Perfetti, François Arnaud, Susan Park, Cree Cicchino
Release Date: September 5, 2025
