The Big Picture

Tendaberry is a refreshing independent film that captures the beauty and essence of New York City in a unique way. The film follows Dakota as she navigates a challenging and chaotic world on her own, finding peace amidst the chaos. Kota Johan delivers a mesmerizing performance, transforming throughout the film and showcasing the complexity of her character.

There have been many great movies set in New York City, but there has never been one quite like writer-director Haley Elizabeth Anderson’s terrific feature debut Tendaberry. Considering that the city is one of the most frequently captured in all of cinema, with filmmakers and audiences alike falling in love with it, this is no easy feat. However, Tendaberry finds beauty in the humblest of places within New York City, making it all feel like something new you’ve never seen before in quite this way or from this specific angle. It is a stunning debut that cements Anderson as a filmmaker to watch, drawing us into the rhythms of a world both sinister and sublime. Crucially, it is a film uniquely attuned to New York City as a living, breathing place that is far more than just a mere setting for a film.

Tendaberry As her boyfriend returns to Ukraine to care for his ailing father, 23-year-old Dakota faces the challenges of a precarious new reality, navigating the complexities of survival in New York City on her own. Release Date January 21, 2024 Director Haley Elizabeth Anderson Cast Sarae Adams , Kota Johan , Yuri Pleskun Runtime 115 minutes Main Genre Drama Writers Haley Elizabeth Anderson

Rather than being a blockbuster that wastes the potential of its setting in favor of the need for spectacle, Tendaberry is a breath of fresh air in a landscape desperately crying out for it and a reminder of what independent cinema can be. Every detail, from the sound of singing on the subway to the Halloween decorations at the one house that always goes all out, feels alive in a way few films could only dream of being. For Anderson, such an approach is integral to understanding a city at a moment in time. In doing so, the film takes on a grand emotional resonance that proves there are still independent voices with something to say about a city as ubiquitous on screen as New York is via the lives of those navigating it.

‘What Is Tendaberry’ About?

The person doing the living is Dakota, played by a mesmerizing Kota Johan in her feature debut, even as the city itself can feel like it is doing everything it can to stifle her. A working-class musician navigating the already perilous time of being in her early 20s, she lives in the South Brooklyn neighborhood of Brighton Beach where the beauty and brutality of the ocean is on full display never too far from her. Living with her boyfriend Yuri, played briefly by the model Yuri Pleskun who was previously seen in the Safdie Brothers’ Heaven Knows What, the film initially sweeps up in their deeply felt romance. As they spend their days getting by and standing by each other when few others will, Anderson never misses a step as we come to see all of who they are with each other in brief snapshots. This is shattered when Yuri is informed his father in Ukraine is not doing well and now needs him to come back to care for him. Just as we got to know the duo so intimately, the delicate connection that was created will be severed. Shortly after he leaves, the two are cut off from each other when Russia invades Ukraine. This leaves Dakota to fend for herself in what could already be an empty and hostile city that now becomes even more so over the ensuing months of her life.

The film is then about her finding some sort of peace in a world that has fallen into chaos as we observe the seasons pass over a year. While the film utilizes perhaps somewhat unnecessary title cards, it ultimately feels like a natural way to organize the more free-flowing nature of the narrative. It is understandable to mark time in such a way, but Anderson finds ways to blur this to often striking effect. As Dakota goes through the routine of her life, such moments will stir up what it was like when Yuri was there to experience it with her. When she is not able to correspond with him over glitchy video calls, she then must carry on without him and these memories start to fade. None of this is ever showy and is instead remarkably self-assured as Anderson brings a real sense of confidence to every single choice. No cut or moment ever feels wasted as it shifts between moments in time that remain profoundly intimate in their presentation yet sweeping in the film’s quietly immense narrative scope.

Utilizing a variety of styles, including tapes, home movies, and 16mm footage, Anderson also puts the film in conversation with the work of the late Nelson Sullivan. The video artist, who passed away in 1989, spent years recording both his life and the lives of others in the city, creating a profile of the LGBTQ community that would endure long after his death. It’s clear Anderson was moved by Sullivan’s work and, in many respects, the film feels like an extension of this. While fictionalized, it takes time to peer in on everything from a karaoke night to dancing in the park. This plays like an echo of what Barry Jenkins did in his debut, Medicine for Melancholy, before transforming into a finale that feels similar to his subsequent film If Beale Street Could Talk. At the same time, Anderson’s technical interests and approach to character make any comparisons only one fraction of the arresting picture being painted here. The film takes on a poetry all its own, especially when spoken by a lead with such presence.

Kota Johan Astounds in ‘Tendaberry’
Image via Sundance

Every so often, there is a breakout performance from a festival like Sundance that immediately grabs hold of you. This year, it was Lily Collias in Good One and Kota Johan here. There will certainly always be deserved praise for already established actors, but one would be remiss to not seek out the spectacular performances that come from lesser-known talents. Not only is Johan one of these talents, but she is the type of performer who truly transforms before your eyes. Over the course of Tendaberry, we see an entire year of change in her character be condensed into small scenes that rely almost entirely on her to give them life. Johan never makes a wrong move in shouldering this as we see the small joys of the young Dakota become injected with a more reserved disposition at the darkness she has had to face. At the same time, while the loneliness and precarity of her life do inevitably shape her, they never define her. We always see a fully realized person breaking through. When you then look back on all that we were taken through in Tendaberry, we are given the all too rare gift of seeing Dakota just as the world once saw and can continue to see Nelson. There are rough edges to each of these portraits, but such moments in life would demand nothing less.

Tendaberry REVIEWHaley Elizabeth Anderson’s terrific feature debut Tendaberry gives New York City a new essential must-see movie with an astounding performance by Kota Johan. ProsThe film is uniquely attuned to New York City as a living, breathing place rather than just a setting for a film as many works reduce it to. Tendaberry utilizes a variety of styles to bring us into a world that many other lesser films would otherwise pass over. Kota Johan transforms before our eyes, making it feel as though we have been taken through an entire lifetime in just a handful of scenes.

Tendaberry had its World Premiere at the 2024 Sundance Film Festival.