Josh O’Connor May Officially Be Film’s Best Young Actor

PARK CITY, Utah—A mournful ballad of loss and resilience in the aftermath of a catastrophic wildfire, Rebuilding couldn’t be timelier. Yet even if it weren’t premiering at the Sundance Film Festival as conflagrations rage through Southern California, Max Walker-Silverman’s follow-up to 2022’s A Love Song would stand on its own as a tender and affecting ode to the strength required to persevere and the interpersonal bonds that lift us up.

Further evidence of both the writer/director’s gift for authentic, poetic portraits of rural Americans’ joys and heartaches, as well as of star Josh O’Connor’s unfussy magnetism, it’s a lyrical tale of combatting misfortune via community.

Dusty (O’Connor) is a cowboy whose world is turned upside down by a rampaging fire that decimates the ranch that’s been in his family for generations, and Rebuilding opens with him staring forlornly at workers cleaning up debris on his property, unsure of what to do or where to turn.

Guided by instinct, he drives to his ex-wife Ruby’s (Meghann Fahy) house, where she lives with her brother Robbie (Sam Engbring), her mother Bess (Amy Madigan), and their adolescent daughter Callie-Rose (Lily LaTorre). The look on the young girl’s face when she sees her dad conveys that theirs is not a thriving relationship. Still, she goes with him to his new temporary dwelling: a trailer in a makeshift park populated by others who’ve been put out by the disaster.

Dusty confesses to one of his neighbors that he enjoys the little things, like feeding his cattle and milking his cows, and if he doesn’t relocate to Montana to work on his cousin’s ranch, he wants to reestablish his homestead. First, however, he finds himself awkwardly trying to reconnect with Callie-Rose, who arrives in his trailer with all sorts of supplies (including multiple juice boxes) provided by her mother, who correctly didn’t trust Dusty to be prepared.

Rations aren’t the only niceties Dusty lacks; he also has no WI-FI, meaning the girl can’t access the school tablet on which she reads stories and answers questions. Dusty has an inspired idea and takes her to the public library, but it’s closed. Nonetheless, its signal is accessible in its immediate vicinity, and thus in his pick-up truck’s flatbed, Callie-Rose recites a fairy tale about a young boy whose magic boots allowed him to travel to any destination his heart desired.

Though he’s a simple, lackadaisical loner without much in the way of social skills, Dusty is convinced one evening by Mila (Kali Reis) into joining his fellow trailer-park survivors for a meal. At a subsequent outdoor dinner, Callie-Rose prods her dad to participate in the conversation, and she strikes up a friendship with Mila’s daughter.

Every one of these disparate individuals is coping with monumental adversity— Mila’s husband perished in the blaze—and yet in their quiet evening get-togethers, they gradually develop relationships founded on trust and selflessness. The latter is epitomized by Mila’s habit of leaving food on the stoop for a long-bearded hermit who never speaks and rarely leaves his abode, at least until he leads Dusty and Mila on a nocturnal trek to show them a hopeful sign of renewal.

Dusty must reconstruct virtually everything in his life, beginning with his rapport with Callie-Rose, and the more time they spend together, the closer they grow. As when he teaches her how to brush and saddle his beloved horse, which is being watched by another rancher, the two share an easygoing chemistry, and O’Connor colors Dusty’s reserved and unambitious demeanor with hints of humor, friendliness, and a desire to be a real, involved dad.

Like the film itself, the actor’s performance is gentle, confident, and expertly modulated, never straining to italicize his character’s conflicted emotions or resorting to bold histrionics to get a point across. Even in a late outburst that reveals the pent-up frustration that had been suppressed beneath Dusty’s tranquil, aww-shucks surface, O’Connor underplays the moment just enough to make it seem genuine.

The actor’s nuanced and stirring turn enlivens Rebuilding, whose storytelling is equally refined. Walker-Silverman has an inherent feel for this barren milieu, where magic-hour sunlight covers the land in a golden glow, and terrifying storm clouds illuminate the night sky in majestic flashes. Plaintive country ballads contribute to the softly melancholic mood, although there are occasions when the action’s mildness neuters its dramatic urgency.

Rarely shifting out of its one tonal register, the film comes close to dragging. Thanks to its star’s charisma, however, it manages to toe the line between sensitive and lethargic, building assuredly to a crisis that forces Dusty to choose between staying or going, enduring or quitting. Rebirth is a complex and arduous process for Rebuilding’s protagonist, and it’s complicated by an unexpected death that reminds him, and everyone else, of the value of togetherness.

Moreover, it affords him an opportunity to set his own course, and if his decision is a somewhat unsurprising one, it still manages to pull at the heartstrings. Walker-Silverman builds his script less out of momentous incidents than small, telling details that, by film’s conclusion, reverberate with poignant meaning, be it the bright blue barn that once decorated Dusty’s ranch—the handiwork of a great grandfather who wanted to please his daughter— or the glow-in-the-dark stars that Callie-Rose sticks on the walls and ceiling of her dad’s trailer, demonstrating that an entire universe is contained right where he resides.

To Dusty, the pain of loss is compounded by the fear of forgetting, and his effort to hold onto the people and places he cherishes is a fight to maintain memories and to create new, lasting ones. Without flashiness, Rebuilding empathetically considers its characters’ plights and imparts a lovely sense of its region, which might accurately be called rugged if not for the compassion demonstrated by those who make it their home because, as Mila states, “Even after everything, I don’t like anywhere better.”

Best of all, it serves as another compelling vehicle for O’Connor, who reconfirms—on the heels of La Chimera and Challengers—that he’s an actor of impressive charm and uncommon dexterity.