A Decade in the Shadow of Desire: Dan Sallitt Returns with What Can’t Be Mentioned
Main Facts: The Return of a Provocative Cinematic Universe
In 2012, American independent filmmaker Dan Sallitt carved out a fiercely singular niche in contemporary cinema with The Unspeakable Act, a sensitive, rigorously unsensationalized film about an 18-year-old girl named Jackie grappling with unrequited incestuous desire for her brother, Matthew. Fourteen years later, Sallitt has returned to the cinematic landscape with a companion piece, What Can’t Be Mentioned, which premiered at the 2026 New York Film Festival.
Runtime-wise, the new feature runs just over an hour, yet it manages to telescope a decade of psychological maturation, shifting dynamics, and lingering trauma. The narrative catches up with Jackie (once again played with spiky, unpredictable precision by Tallie Medel) in her late twenties. Outwardly, she has built a conventional life: she is a professional therapist sharing an apartment with her boyfriend, Anthony (Kyle McCormack). However, the equilibrium of her adult life is abruptly destabilized when she learns that Matthew (Sky Hirschkron)—now settled down with his partner Lily (Kit Zauhar)—is expecting a child.
Rather than leaning into cheap exploitation or melodramatic shock value, Sallitt’s sequel explores the quieter, more insidious ways that youthful infatuations linger in the human psyche, treating Jackie’s lingering attachment less as a phase to be cured and more as a chronic condition to be managed.
Chronology: From Adolescent Yearning to Adult Neurosis
To fully understand the gravity of What Can’t Be Mentioned, one must trace the trajectory of Jackie and Matthew’s relationship across Sallitt’s two distinct cinematic epochs.
2011–2012: The Genesis of The Unspeakable Act
The original film opens in the spring of 2011 with Jackie’s internal monologue expressing her belief that she and Matthew "belonged to each other." As Matthew attempts to establish healthy boundaries to pursue conventional relationships, Jackie spirals into physical and emotional distress—struggling with insomnia, dramatic weight loss, and intense jealousy.
When Matthew leaves for college, Jackie is forced to construct an independent identity, navigating high school classes and casual sexual encounters while keeping her fixation quietly burning in the background. Sallitt famously rejected the notion that Jackie’s desire was merely a transitory teenage phase; instead, he framed it as an innate facet of her psychology that she would have to suppress to function within society.
2026: The Reckoning in What Can’t Be Mentioned
A decade later, the sequel finds Jackie navigating the rigid routines of young adulthood. Cracks in her facade quickly multiply:
Professional Complications: Working as a therapist, Jackie experiences uncomfortable countertransference when a middle-aged client privately confesses anxieties about her own children potentially exploring sexuality together.
Domestic Strain: Jackie and Anthony experience sexual incompatibility, driving them into awkward sex therapy sessions that Jackie finds difficult to take seriously.
The Upstate Trip: Upon hearing news of Matthew and Lily’s impending child, Jackie travels upstate for a week-long visit. Rather than gracefully integrating into the household, she consumes quantities of red wine and probes Lily with deliberately provocative questions regarding her bisexuality and her intimate life with Matthew.
Supporting Data and Production Details
While independent cinema often relies on high-concept hooks or explosive pacing, Sallitt’s formal approach remains remarkably austere.
Cast and Creative Team:
Tallie Medelreturns as Jackie, seamlessly evolving her character’s adolescent instability into matter-of-fact adult neuroticism.
Sky Hirschkron reprises his role as Matthew, maintaining an almost defiantly unflappable composure.
Kit Zauhar (Actual People, This Closeness) joins the cast as Lily, matching Hirschkron’s even-keeled temperament.
Kyle McCormack plays Jackie’s long-suffering partner, Anthony.
Formal Style: Sallitt retains the static compositions and lack of camera movement that defined The Unspeakable Act. However, he adjusts his editing rhythm, utilizing sharper, more rigid cuts to mirror the structured monotony of young professional life.
Continuity: The film enriches its universe by weaving in references to characters from the original movie—including Jackie’s childhood therapist Linda (Caroline Luft), who appears via Zoom, and sibling Will, while omitting second-oldest sister Jeanne, exactly as Jackie predicted a decade prior.
Distribution Status: Following its premiere at the 64th New York Film Festival at Alice Tully Hall, What Can’t Be Mentioned is currently seeking U.S. distribution.
Official Perspectives and Filmmaker Intentions
Dan Sallitt has long been recognized as a filmmaker of rare intellectual rigor, often compared by critics to Eric Rohmer for his interest in talkative, behavior-driven character studies. Upon the release of The Unspeakable Act, Sallitt discussed his perspective on the protagonist’s taboo desires in an interview with Filmmaker Magazine:
"I don’t see Jackie’s incestuous desire as a transitory thing or part of her passage to adulthood. I think it’s just the way she is, and she will have to keep a lid on that desire in order to live comfortably, will have to cultivate other aspects of herself."
This foundational philosophy dictates the narrative architecture of the sequel. In What Can’t Be Mentioned, Lily responds to Jackie’s probing, uncomfortable questions with monk-like tranquility, noting that her hippie upbringing made discussing intimacy "like talking about the laundry." Matthew, similarly unfazed, covers for his sister’s erratic behavior when Lily questions her mental state and sobriety, assuring his partner that Jackie is simply "cutting loose."
Through these interactions, Sallitt highlights a quiet tragedy: Jackie is trapped by a secret she can never fully voice, forced to navigate the periphery of the life her brother has successfully built without her.
Implications: The Hard-Won Lessons of Maturity
What Can’t Be Mentioned ultimately succeeds by expanding upon a profound coming-of-age truth: the realization that human beings cannot always have what they desperately desire, and that emotional survival often requires accepting permanent, low-grade heartache.
By revisiting these characters ten years later, Sallitt avoids the trap of neat, Hollywood resolutions. There is no miraculous cure for Jackie’s past, nor is there an explosive family confrontation that clears the air. Instead, the film closes on a discomforting yet hard-won note of realism. Jackie remains neurotic, spiky, and occasionally destructive, but she endures. In charting her journey, Sallitt and Medel offer a rare cinematic portrait of neurosis not as a plot device, but as a lifelong landscape—proving that sometimes, survival means learning to live alongside the things you can never mention.
