Twinless: Death Is Irrevocable, You Can’t Take It Back
by Sydney Reyes
Watching Twinless at the 2025 Melbourne International Film Festival was a constant burst of laughter while trying to hold back tears. When your twin passes away and you’re forced to face the rest of your life without them, you end up in a pain that no one really understands. Imagine someone seeing a reflection of themselves inside a casket, and everyone else going on about how much they look like the late person. Twinless centres around surviving halves, Roman (Dylan O’Brien) and Dennis (James Sweeney), who meet at a twin bereavement support group and form an emotionally intimate bond through their shared trauma. The film takes us through a hyper-specific form of grieving: losing someone who not only looks exactly like you, but was also the person you were with since the beginning of your time on Earth.
Dylan O’Brien’s role as Roman and Rocky is one of his more unique parts, as he plays twins with contrasting personalities. One is in mourning, and the other was a carefree, queer man. We only see Rocky for a short time, but it’s in how O’Brien portrays Roman that best tugs at the audience’s heartstrings. He is a hurt, vulnerable man, and has constant bursts of anger. Despite this, O'Brien's raw performance makes audiences want to comfort him. You see the pain and longing in Roman’s eyes when he sees twins out in the wild, and he stares at them with silent defeat. Or when Dennis shares how he lost his twin brother, Dean, to the support group, and it cuts to Roman sitting across the room giving him a wink in understanding. The film is sprinkled with several moments that strip Roman down to the core to show us the after effects of losing a twin. Dylan O’Brien delivers an emotionally moving performance that shows the silent power of grief.
Despite the inherent sadness, Twinless doesn’t fail to find humour in the process. Sweeney, also the writer and director of the film, laces in moments that bring out collective laughs in the audience of my cinema. That’s 500 people responding and connecting with the film, giggling and sympathizing with these characters. The dialogue is snappy, characters deliver comedically timed lines, and dark comedy is used as a way to shake up the gloomy narrative. Roman is not exactly book smart and the film pokes fun at this, providing Twinless’ most amusing bits.
It’s full of surprises. For the first quarter, you’re trapped in a fantasy—boy meets boy and maybe something can bloom from there. When it breaks, a sour taste sticks in your mouth for the rest of the film. Twinless takes unexpected turns that leave audiences on the edge of their seat, grappling between melancholy for what has happened and morbid curiosity about what will unfold next. At the core of it, the film shows a non-romanticized version of grief. It diverges from the pure healing and recovery narrative that I initially expected. While it is healing to an extent, the dark comedy nature of the film exposes us to events that take advantage of Roman and indirectly lead him to accept his brother’s death.
While such events are unlikely to happen in real life, what’s true is this: Twinless shows us that actual, proper closure after losing a loved one is unattainable. People like Roman let it fester, while others, like Dennis, latch onto familiarity and lash out—but our ways of coping don't excuse how we treat others. You must work on this, and work on yourself to eventually come close. When that happens, it’s on your own terms and not the textbook definition of “closure.” Twinless is a creative, entertaining, and twisted ride that examines grief through dark comedy. It’s a wonderful addition to the many ways we can explain the complex emotion in film.