I Saw the TV Glow, an A24 production directed by Jane Schoenbrun is an absolute masterpiece and a beautiful transgender allegory. I feel as though the movie stands for more and is very up for interpretation depending on your experiences. The meaning of film can strongly change depending on personal perspective. The film is touching and has a strong personal impact on viewers. 

I Saw the TV Glow utilized colors in a beautiful way, keeping the theme of neon colors throughout the film specifical blue, pink, and purple. The colors were clearly a symbol for self identity and gender expressionism. The colors remain vibrant throughout the entire movie, creating beautiful contrast in shots where they are filmed in the dark. This also creates a beautiful concept of the “inner self” that it is mentioned in the film, building on the transgender allegory. 

The character Owen played by Justice Smith almost seemed empty throughout the film. Owen is a lonely kid who has a hard time building relationships with kids his own age. He and an older girl from his high school, Maddy who is played by Bridgett Lundy-Paine bond over a TV show called “The Pink Opaque”. His personality is beautifully executed, with a voice inspired by Juilanne Moore’s character in Boogie Nights, according to Smith. This was a very strong choice that you can see throughout the film in order to constrict and confine the character within himself. This is highly representative of the concept of being trapped in one’s own body. The effect is uncomfortable in a way that seems incredibly intentional. The character seems so impersonal, despite being the largest part of the film. This helps build the transgender allegory, as he shows how distantly he interacts with a world that is not his, in a body that is not his own.   

Smith did an excellent job creating an almost out-of-body feeling that you can easily sense throughout the entirety of the Movie. As the movie progresses you can notice how this out-of-body feeling begins to grow until it is too late. This sticks out to me as a metaphor for remaining in the closet as a transgender person and how easy it is to deny yourself of your true identity. There are minor things about the movie that may come off to be mistakes, coworkers of Owen not aging despite years passing, only to realize that it all adds up to be Owen’s fate staring him in the face. 

Owen continues to live a very boring and uneventful life where he is clearly uncomfortable with himself. When Maddie comes back to visit him after going missing for many years she tries to help him by telling him he needs to do something very scary in order to emerge as a better person on the other side. He is very reluctant to take this leap and of course he never does. This keeps not only the characters, but the audience wondering if what she is saying is true, vacillating between the choice on a knife’s edge until the very end. 

The life that he is living almost seems less realistic than the lives of the two characters in “The Pink Opaque”. This becomes very obvious when things would glitch such as everyone around him freezing and messages mysteriously appearing that were written to him in the arcade and on the street. 

At the very end of the film Owen literally opens himself up and his past feelings of uneasiness and timidness fade away when he finally realizes who he really is meant to be. This film utilizes surrealism, similar to that of the television show,Twin Peaks, using strange timelines that do not always seem to make sense, creating an off-putting dreaminess within the world of the film. The entire life of the characters seem derealized and distant, as if they are not living reality, which it is later revealed that they were not. It is a very interesting choice that instead of having a great awakening where all becomes clear, the film remains unexplainable and mysterious, until it is absolutely undeniable that Owen is not living in reality and Maddie had been right all along. Even faced with this, there is no clarity of true reality. Owen dooms himself to die in an alternate life where he knows he is not himself. The ending is bleak and abrupt and symbolizes the real life feelings that closeted transgender people have about transitioning and how some never do, and accept their lives as people that they are not. 

This film is beautiful in every aspect a film can be. Though there is definitely a targeted audience of transgender people, it speaks to everyone. There is something deeply relatable and personal for every audience member in this film. It is bizarre in unexpected ways and is a piece of absolute art, having a clear message while leaving appropriate room for interpretation. Overall, we give I Saw the TV Glow 4.8 out of 5 stars.