Only I Can Hear
**Seen for the 2022 Atlanta Film Festival.
One of the most profound statements we hear in “Only I Can Hear” is when one of the film’s subjects, Nyla, says to the camera, “I’ve always wanted to be deaf.” To our ears, that feels like a strange revelation, but as we dig more into the world director Itaru Matsui brings us into, we kind of get it. You see, Nyla is a CODA- a Child of Deaf Adults. Her family has a long history of deaf individuals, and for her in that moment, it would make more sense to be fully engaged in that community than to have her life straddling two different ones. If you watched Best Picture winner “CODA,” and wanted to learn more about what it’s like to be a CODA, “Only I Can Hear” will give you many lessons, and I would argue, many better lessons, although I found the Oscar-winner deeply moving.
This film follows four CODAs- Nyla, Jessica, McKenzie and Ashley- as they go through a world which asks them to be “normal,” but their family life demands a different type of normalcy. During the film, we see all of them converge at a two-week retreat with other CODAs, and they feel like they are truly seen during those 14 days in a way they are not for the rest of the year. School, career, spending time with friends, it all feels different for these individuals and others whom have been tasked to walk between two worlds. We see Ashley in Japan, as she is looking at what it was like for deaf people during the tsunami of 2011, and we see her talk to another CODA, and how it was informing the deaf community of what was happening. She’s also pregnant, and so, we see her wondering whether her child will be born deaf, or hearing. Either option will present challenges for them; the love of family will never be one of them. Meanwhile, McKenzie is getting ready to go to college, and away from her family; will she be able to keep that connection strong when she’s around more hearing people? She has anxiety about it, but she also seems ready for the challenge.
“Only I Can Hear” is only 53 minutes long, but I could have gone longer with these individuals, and the people in their lives. That is the mark of a great documentary, and a great film. This film presents us with ideas that, as a hearing person from a hearing family and community, I never considered when it comes to how isolated other hearing people could feel in the world. “Only I Can Hear” opened me up to those ideas, and tasks us to be more accepting. The rest of the world should take notes.
