Premise: A high school senior tries to balance her dream of being a singer with the reality of everyone else in her struggling fishing family being deaf.
This was the opening movie to the first Sundance I ever "attended". I was only able to attend because they moved it from exclusively in Utah to online for anyone will to pay for a ticket. It still counts though! And, it seems fitting that the most purely enjoyable movie I'd see this Sundance would be the very first one I saw.
The big problem I run into with a lot of Sundance movies is what I call the "short story problem". Basically, the movies feel underfed; like they struggled to get to 90 minutes rather than need to be cut down like a lot of bigger movies. There aren't enough ideas in them to sustain a movie. The only reason they aren't short films is that there's no money in short films. The easiest way around this is to make a very busy movie, and that's what CODA is. There's a lot going on in this.
CODA is about Ruby (Emilia Jones). She's a high school senior with parents (Marlee Matlin, Troy Kotsur) and a brother (Daniel Durant) who are all deaf. Her family are fishermen struggling to make ends meet. As the only member of her family who can hear, she's often required to speak and listen for her family in the community. Her brother and father aren't even allowed to go out on their boat legally without Ruby to hear the radio. Ironically, Ruby's dream is to sing. After enrolling in the choir class at school, her teacher (Eugenio Derbez) quickly identifies that she might be good enough to get into a prestigious music school in Boston and decides to tutor her. And there's the boy she likes in school, her crippling shyness because she grew up in a family where she's not used to her actual voice being heard, and the family's risky decision to start a local co-op to sell their fish. The central conflict of the movie is Ruby deciding which of her many responsibilities comes first.
By filling this movie with so much story, it never feels small. Writer/director Sian Heder does a really excellent job balancing everything that's going on. I didn't feel like any story was underfed. Certain stories left more room to be explored but in a good way. Not everything needs to be resolved. The idea of a girl from a deaf family who just wants to sing sounds a little cheesy. It certainly made me suspicious of the movie going in, but it handles it very intelligently. It thinks through all the actual difficulties and concerns of the characters in this situation. Ruby was made fun of at school, because, being in a deaf family, she didn't talk right when she started school. Her brother is frustrated by how much the family leans on Ruby to hear and translate for them and how the responsibility she feels for the family gets in the way of her other dreams. Her parents can't always relate to her in the way they'd like.
Ultimately, by making it a story about believing in yourself and tugging at just enough heart strings, CODA is able to mask any small shortcomings it has on a story level. It's a feel-good movie with a satisfying ending and plenty of laughs. It's got just about everything you need for a Sundance breakout (which is why Apple spent so much to purchase it). Emilia Jones is likely to get a lot of work from how capably she leads this movie. (Are there any other major YA book series left to adapt?) It's also a joy to see Marlee Matlin in her meatiest role in years. This is simply a lovely movie that started off my "first Sundance" very strong.
Verdict: Strongly Recommend
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