Film

Years Later: The Unbelievable Truth and Its Consequences

Name: Years Later: The Unbelievable Truth and Its Consequences
Genre: Documentary
Released: 2010
Cast: Hal Hartley, Adrienne Shelly, D.J. Mendel, Robert John Burke, Martin Donovan

A slim documentary about Hal Hartley's independent filmmaking practice, built from interviews with the director and his frequent collaborators. It's a filmmaker's conversation about style, process, and the peculiar durability of making art on your own terms. For anyone who loves Hartley's deadpan dialogue and formally precise aesthetic, or who wants to understand how a singular voice survives outside the system.

If you liked this

The Unbelievable Truth1990

Hartley's debut: proof that low-budget indie cinema could be formally inventive and funny without apology. Sharp dialogue, awkward romance, and a visual confidence that announces an auteur. This is what the documentary reflects on.

But It's eighteen years old, shot on video, and moves at Hartley's deliberately paced rhythm. If you need plot momentum or conventional charm, it will feel slow and strange.

Trust1990

A brilliant escalation of Hartley's method: a film about communication breakdown that uses its form to deepen the theme. Murder, pregnancy, the impossibility of talking to anyone. Formally daring and emotionally precise.

But It's austere and bleak. Hartley's deadpan distance works perfectly for the material, but some viewers will find it cold rather than moving.

Simple Men1992

Two brothers on a road trip to find their estranged father. Hartley at his most playful: the dialogue is droll, the situations absurd, and there's a weird tenderness underneath. Still formally controlled but more alive.

But The plot meanders and the humor is subtle. It's a character study disguised as a crime film, so expectations set by genre will mislead you.

Not sure tonight? Get a pick in a minute, starting from Years Later: The Unbelievable Truth and Its Consequences

The wildcard

Something you would not have found on your own.

Slacker1990

Both are 1990 American independent debuts built on dialogue, formal constraint, and the conviction that cinema could be made without studios. They show two paths away from the mainstream.

Richard Linklater's debut, shot on video the same year Hartley made The Unbelievable Truth. Both directors were building radical cinema from constraint. Slacker is looser and more digressive, but shares Hartley's faith in dialogue and formal independence. The connection isn't obvious until you see how both directors privilege conversation over plot.

But It's ninety minutes of overheard conversations with no protagonist. If you need narrative propulsion or character development, it will feel like eavesdropping on strangers.

Flirt1996

Hartley remakes the same story three times—in New York, Berlin, and Tokyo—with slight variations. A formal experiment that's also deeply romantic. It's the purest expression of his method: constraint as creative fuel.

But The repetition is the point, which means it requires patience and attention. If you're looking for narrative surprise, you'll be frustrated.

Henry Fool1998

A masterpiece about a man and a poet, about creation and delusion, about the price of integrity. Darkly funny and philosophically ambitious. Thomas Jay Ryan's performance is extraordinary, and the film has real emotional weight.

But It's two and a half hours of deliberate pacing and Hartley's mannered dialogue. The ending is bleak. It demands patience and rewards it unevenly.

Fay Grim2007

A sequel to Henry Fool, tracking what happened next. Bigger in scope, with espionage and philosophy tangled together. Proof that Hartley can work in wider contexts without losing his voice.

But You need to see Henry Fool first, and even then it's a continuation rather than a renewal. Some will find it less focused than its predecessor.

No Such Thing2002

A monster movie made by Hartley: a teenage girl meets a monster in Iceland and falls in love. Dark fairy tale logic applied to Hartley's themes about speech and connection. Formally beautiful and genuinely strange.

But The genre framework sits uneasily with Hartley's naturalistic dialogue. The film doesn't quite reconcile its own ambitions, and that tension is either fascinating or frustrating.

Surviving Desire1992

A novella-length film about a teacher's obsession with a student. Intimate and morally complicated. It shows Hartley working at shorter length, which focuses his strengths.

But It's a short work, so the emotional payoff is necessarily limited. The subject matter—unrequited desire—is melancholic rather than satisfying.

Stalker1979

Both directors use formal rigor and extended takes to examine how people fail to speak to each other. Both believe cinema's distance—its refusal to explain—is its strength.

Andrei Tarkovsky's meditation on desire, speech, and the unknowability of other people. Like Hartley, Tarkovsky uses long takes and deliberate pacing to force attention. The film is about the failure of communication, told through forms that refuse easy meaning. Slow but magnetic.

But It's 163 minutes of ambiguous philosophy in long shots. Tarkovsky's pace makes Hartley look like a thriller. Patience isn't enough; you need faith.