I Used To Be Funny -

Ally Pankiw’s debut feature, I Used to Be Funny , is a film that resists easy categorization. On its surface, it is a dramedy about a struggling stand-up comedian named Sam (a revelatory Rachel Sennott) trying to reconnect with a missing teenage girl, Brooke (Olga Petsa). Yet the film’s fractured narrative—oscillating between sun-drenched “before” sequences and a grey, agoraphobic “after”—functions as a formal echo of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). More than a simple mystery or a recovery story, I Used to Be Funny is a profound meditation on the insidious nature of gendered violence, the paradox of the “cool girl” persona, and the arduous, non-linear journey from being a victim to becoming a survivor. Pankiw argues that the punchline of trauma is not the event itself, but the way it forces a woman to become a stranger to her own identity.

Visually and aurally, Pankiw constructs a language of dissonance that mirrors Sam’s internal state. The “before” scenes are drenched in warm, nostalgic 16mm grain and a lo-fi indie soundtrack, evoking a dream of early adulthood that is already tinged with melancholy. The “after” scenes are digital, cold, and claustrophobic, often shot in static mid-shots that trap Sam in her own apartment. This is not a film about closure; it is a film about oscillation. Sam does not triumphantly return to the stage to a standing ovation. Instead, the final sequence shows her tentatively writing a single joke, then deleting it, then writing it again. The film concludes not with a punchline, but with a breath. It rejects the redemptive arc that demands a survivor return to their “old self.” Sam will never be the person she “used to be.” But the final, quiet suggestion is that the new person—sober, scarred, and serious—might be more interesting than the comedian ever was. I Used to Be Funny

The film’s title is its thesis. The past-tense “used to be” signals a fundamental rupture in Sam’s sense of self. In the vibrant “before” timeline, Sam is magnetic: sharp-witted, sexually confident, and aspiring to a career in comedy. She navigates her live-in nanny job for the affable, grief-stricken father Cameron (Ennis Esmer) with charm and ease. Crucially, her humor is her armor and her currency—it deflects intimacy while inviting attention. However, after a sexual assault by a former acquaintance (and a friend of the family), the film’s “after” timeline presents a Sam who is almost catatonic. She has abandoned comedy, stopped showering, and lives in a state of perpetual irritation with her supportive roommate. The film refuses to show the assault as a spectacle; instead, it shows the consequences. Sam’s loss of humor is not merely sadness—it is a linguistic and psychological un-housing. Comedy requires a belief in a shared, predictable reality. Trauma shatters that reality. As Sam tells a support group, she is not afraid of the dark; she is afraid of the light, because light means having to engage with a world that feels fundamentally unsafe. Pankiw masterfully illustrates that for survivors, the ability to “be funny” is often the first casualty of violence. Ally Pankiw’s debut feature, I Used to Be

In conclusion, I Used to Be Funny is a devastatingly accurate portrayal of what happens when the performance of happiness becomes impossible. By weaving together the language of stand-up, the genre of the missing-person thriller, and the slow cinema of depression, Ally Pankiw has crafted a uniquely empathetic work. The film argues that trauma is not a backstory but an ongoing presence; it is the heckler in the back of the mind that never stops shouting. The true heroism of Sam is not that she reports her assault or saves Brooke, but that she chooses to exist in the “after” at all. In a culture that pressures women to be resilient, funny, and agreeable, I Used to Be Funny makes a radical case for being allowed to be angry, silent, and broken—and for that brokenness to be the very beginning of a new, unglamorous, but authentic life. The funniest people are often the saddest, the film reminds us, but the saddest people deserve the space to stop performing and simply survive. More than a simple mystery or a recovery

Central to Sam’s fractured identity is her fraught relationship with Brooke. The film uses their dynamic to critique the myth of the “cool girl”—the woman who is laid-back, non-confrontational, and accepts male behavior without complaint. Sam initially embodies this role for the men in her life, particularly her attacker. More subtly, she encourages it in Brooke. In flashbacks, Sam gives Brooke advice about dating and fitting in, unaware that Brooke is being groomed by a predatory older man, Noah (Caleb Hearon). Sam’s complicity is not malicious but banal; it is the unconscious transmission of patriarchal survival tactics. When Sam finally learns the truth about Noah and Brooke’s relationship, her guilt is paralyzing. She realizes that her own assault and Brooke’s exploitation are two verses of the same sick song. The film’s central question—will Sam report her own rape to the police to help the case against Noah?—is a brutal test of solidarity. It asks whether a woman can overcome her own trauma to protect another. Pankiw suggests that recovery is not an individual act but a communal one; Sam only begins to truly heal when she stops trying to be “funny” or “cool” and starts being honest, even at great personal cost.