Rye Lane Movie Review

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This is a new way to tell a story. It’s enjoyable and sweet… everything you want in a romance, but more so since just about everything here is, as I mentioned earlier, new.

I cannot believe this is director Raine Allen-Miller’s feature film directorial debut. She has learned a lot during her short film directing days. I’ll be honest, the movie is a bit slow in, I’d say, the first twenty minutes, but it’s in those moments that our leads learn about one another. And all is forgiven once the ball gets rolling and Allen-Miller finds her voice.

The writers are Tom Melia, Nathan Bryon, who don’t have much under their belt either. However, it’s nice to see that they were able to reinvent the genre with Allen-Miller and their talented cast. They all took their jobs to entertain us in what seems to be a romance-free Hollywood these days, giving us what we need when everything we see or hear on the news is nasty and negative.

Dom (David Jonsson) and Yas (Vivian Oparah) meet in the bathroom of an art gallery. Both are grieving the loss and pain of the end of a relationship. They’re working on returning their aching hearts to a healthy state of being, especially Dom, who’s not doing so well with it. A fabulous and supreme scene, by the way.

In a move a twentysomething would find easy to do, Yas ends up helping him by jumping in on a conversation he’s having with his ex-girlfriend and her new love. This love just so happens to also be his now former best friend. Yas is brilliant at butting in and letting his ex know that she’s a fool for letting Dom go but that she’s happy she did because he’s now all hers. I don’t want to give away the scene. Still, the inflection and personality Yas showcases is what makes Vivian Oparah so unique. Look for her to be around much, much longer. 

The story plays out in a series of clever flashbacks that get better and better. The camera work is fun and often a bit crazy, but that’s the charm of this motion picture. There are circumstances such as these that you’ve seen in other stories. Sure, they may be similar, but that’s where it ends. This is staggeringly noteworthy; golden. Yeah, the narrative of young love tugging at the heart and soul has been shown to you before, but not quite like this.