Between Breath & Silence

Thomas Sergeant’s personal and true-life inspired short Between Breath & Silence explores grief and loss in relationships that have strained. It is a touching, at-times difficult watch that holds a mirror to the audience’s own relations with family, and matches the emotional weight with complexity to result in a worthy and considered reflection on anguish.

Tom (Thomas Sergeant) returns home after receiving news that his dad Paul (Graeme Hawley) has been hospitalised with a serious illness. Tom’s hesitancy about returning originates from years of tension with both his dad and brother Ryan (Sam Retford), whose issues go unstated. However, Tom’s hesitancy at including his boyfriend Matt (Kris Mochrie) in proceedings suggest sexuality has something to do with it. As his prognosis becomes terminal, Tom knows this moment may be the last chance he has to repair bridges.

Between Breath & Silence is a small-scale yet intense short film that seeks to challenge its viewers with imperfect families and circumstances that demand grace and forgiveness to navigate. Presented with devastating news, Tom is forced to re-submerge in a difficult family dynamic that he had distanced himself from. Tom Sergeant’s understated scripting of his characters ensures the audience unravel these dynamics slowly, and are trusted to read between lines to identify the sources of strife between the cast. This accomplishment is even more impressive considering the true-life inspiration of the story, and his ability to make each character believable and empathetic even when they carry deep flaws. Director Nicole Pott also captures the quiet, mournful atmosphere with a patient style that lets awkwardness, emotion and unspoken words linger.

Viewers are forced to think more deeply about the characters due to the depth that each main cast member imbues. We meet Tom in a difficult moment – one where he is confronted with a stark choice between repairing family relationships and endangering his romantic one by showing more grace than might be deserved to those who disapprove of him. Graeme Hawley’s Paul is a similarly humble father in the face of his own mortality – yet viewers are also asked to see the pain that both he and Kris Mochrie’s Matt have caused due to suggested prejudice. Where such dynamics could easily lead to melodrama or overperformance, the cast understand that the quiet and unsaid works much more effectively at getting across the problems the family has in the context of the moment, and means the ultimate outpouring of emotion when it arrives is all the more effective.

Add to this that the film looks great in its smaller scale framing, and the result is a really well rounded personal short. The discomforting ambiance of Paul’s hospital room almost demands that characters restrain their true feelings, causing a notable tension to build in the viewer as slight but unconventional camera framing draws us in close to a family’s inner turmoil. The contrast between the softness of lighting when Tom is outside of his family and the darker tones that emerge when he is surrounded is also a noticeable move that shifts as bonds are altered.

The success of Between Breath & Silence comes from the slight touch of its writer/star and director who understand that the power of such short films come from characters who are relatable, empathetic and well developed. It is a great testament to Tom Sergeant’s ability as a writer to bare such a personal story as well as he does here, and his story will move people regardless of whether they can fully relate to it or not.