
When Taryn, a Northern Irish runaway, finds herself in trouble in Ocean City, MD, she seeks refuge with her aunt and uncle in Baltimore. But Kim and Bill have problems of their own: they're trying to handle the end of their marriage gracefully for the sake of their daughter Abby, just home from her first year of college. A story of family revelations, people finding each other and letting each other go, looking for love where they've found it before and, when that doesn't wor... (Full plot summary below)
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When Taryn, a Northern Irish runaway, finds herself in trouble in Ocean City, MD, she seeks refuge with her aunt and uncle in Baltimore. But Kim and Bill have problems of their own: they're trying to handle the end of their marriage gracefully for the sake of their daughter Abby, just home from her first year of college. A story of family revelations, people finding each other and letting each other go, looking for love where they've found it before and, when that doesn't work, figuring out where they might find it next.
Leave your thoughts about I Used to Be Darker.
| Boston GlobePeter KeoughThis sounds like it could be austere and schematic, but the affecting, authentic performances from the first-time actors make these characters thoroughly authentic. |
| The A.V. ClubA.A. DowdDrenched in the evening glow of its urban and suburban backdrops, Darker comes alive in the dark, when its characters are drowning their sorrows in song, the sauce, or conversation. |
| NewcityRay PrideJeremy Saulnier's summer-spent cinematography is gentle and nothing shy of exquisite. |
| Chicago ReaderJ. R. JonesThe couple, both musicians, are in the midst of a bitter breakup, and Porterfield frequently trains the camera on one or the other as each performs his melancholy tunes; this stops the narrative dead in its tracks. |
| Film Freak CentralWalter Chawa celebration if you can call something this downbeat celebratory, of what film should act like and look like when you leave it alone. |
| Toronto StarPeter HowellUnfolds like a music album, with emotive songs supplying information that doesn't need repeating in the lean screenplay, which the director co-wrote with Amy Belk. |
| Slant MagazineJesse CataldoThe songs performed here function as the creative end point of emotional trauma, revealing pain gradually transfigured into art. |
| Los Angeles TimesSheri LindenIt's a story of contained chaos, quietly observed — one that catches fire more in retrospect than in the viewing. |
| The PlaylistJessica KiangSome occasionally awkward performance moments aside, though, the film is very compassionate towards its characters and finds just about enough original insight within the well-worn family drama genre to keep things from feeling too familiar—it’s a just a shame there couldn’t have been a little more vitality injected early on. |
| Village VoiceNick SchagerThe film exhibits a contemplative quiet and attentiveness to detail that enhances its issues of regret, bitterness, and confusion, many of which are rooted in thorny parent-child relations. |