Most of the film takes place in the couple’s Manhattan apartment. Skye labors over a large canvas in a bid to distract herself from the crisis at hand—or maybe she just doesn’t see any reason why she shouldn’t do what she would do any other day. Cisco tries to contact old friends on Skype and watches television, abandoning any concerns about sitting too close to the screen (there isn’t time to incur damage to his eyes). Notably, Skype becomes an essential presence in the apartment, highlighting the couple’s isolation while serving as the only connection to their loved ones. Ferrara brings this thematic link between technology and human relationships to its peak during a scene in which a Vietnamese delivery boy, whose name Cisco finally asks after having seen him “thousands of times,” uses Cisco’s laptop to Skype with his family. Although Cisco and Skye can’t understand his language, they watch intently, vicariously tapping into the conversation’s emotional weight. This is especially true for the spiritually inclined Skye, who tearfully thanks the boy and tells him she’s happy to have known him.

The film’s characters concern themselves with revisiting, and in some cases reigniting, relationships they may have allowed to go stale under better circumstances. Early on, during a lengthy sex scene, Ferrara captures the couple’s sighs, moans and snatches of whispered, affectionate conversation with pristine clarity. The camera is unhurried as it lingers over their nude bodies, rendered sharply in close-ups. This could be the last time these people will ever make love, and Ferrara is interested in the enormity of that realization on a personal level. The film contains many such moments of closeness, whether broadcast from the world outside, as with the newscaster who signs off for the last time in a heartfelt address, or focused inward, like the nightmarish vision Cisco has while meditating.

Although it runs a slight eighty-two minutes, 4:44 Last Day on Earth is no doubt an ambitious work, as Ferrara attempts to filter the human experience through the dark lens of Earth’s final hours. Fortunately, he achieves a fascinating end result, a deeply expressive film smartly assembled as a collection of moments rather than a plot-driven narrative. The dramas specific to Cisco’s life, which continue to plague him even as they rapidly approach non-existence, are interspersed with more ordinary, everyday instances, and Ferrara treats both with equal severity, as the apocalyptic context allows him to question what exactly defines a human life.

Unable to rely on his abusive, neglectful father for guidance, Ted instead looks up to and even idolizes his older brother “Truck” (Alex Frost). Eager to fit in with Truck and his friends, who together call themselves the Kings, Ted, despite having no sexual experience, joins in their “game” to see who among the group can score with the most freshman girls. A smart, well-liked kid, Ted already has a lot going for him without getting involved with the hard-partying Kings—his brother even tells him so—but he ignores all this in his desire to impress his older brother, even as he encounters the more disturbing aspects of Truck’s personality.

The boundaries of Truck’s role as older brother are strangely erratic. He is perturbed when Ted unexpectedly arrives at a party with two six-packs but has no qualms about instructing his younger brother to rape a girl while she’s passed out drunk. Fortunately, Flores addresses these inconsistencies as the film progresses, gradually revealing Truck’s darker side as the pressures mount. And Frost is well cast as Truck, who is ostensibly a complete reversal of the actor’s previous turn as one of the young killers in Gus Van Sant’s Elephant, yet his jock exterior is charged with a similarly manic charisma.

Flores avoids reducing his teen-aged characters to bland archetypes in his effort to create a realistic environment capable of anchoring the increasingly weighty material. There are no thirty-year-olds barely passing as high school students. Ted and the Kings speak bluntly, not with overly conscious slang but in tense, aggressively charged exchanges whose liberal use of the word “fuck” never feels forced or unnecessary. And though the dialogue between the younger cast members is occasionally stilted, Flores for the most part achieves a thoughtful, convincing depiction of teenage interaction, which isn’t as simple as it might seem—certainly a lesser director couldn’t yield half as many credible displays of underage drunkenness as Flores does here.

Often a film that focus on teens–regardless of whether it’s dramatic or comedic–aims for a sense of realism, hoping the audience can connect with its portrayal of high school life without compromising whatever trappings make it unique. To his film’s benefit, Flores doesn’t forget that his characters aren’t just teenagers: Ted and Truck will be adults very soon, and they’re already realizing their actions bear consequences that reach further than they might be willing to admit, which means every decision the brothers make feels all the more harrowing. Almost Kings may deal in well-trod “virgin” territory (oxymoronic pun absolutely intended), but in doing so it achieves unexpected weight.

The film pairs illuminating archival footage of the Mardi Gras festivities with testimony from gay krewe members who reflect at length on the sense of community fostered by the drag balls. Of course, this means plenty of shots of gorgeous, painstakingly assembled costumes. For instance, Bill McCarthy, 2008’s captain of the Krewe of Petronius (the first gay Mardi Gras krewe), describes his royalty train as “a huge Oriental rug” with about five hundred appliqués. The costume he models at the film’s conclusion is massive and looks as if it might explode, sprinkling the room with sequins and feathers.

Wolff wisely emphasizes Mardi Gras’ significance to all New Orleanians, suggesting the legendary festival was the perfect avenue by which gays could strengthen their visibility. As drag ball veteran George Roth recalls, Mardi Gras was a “monumental” time for locals, and parents commonly dressed their children in costume—early inspiration for future drag monarchs. By favorably acknowledging the entire population’s zeal for Mardi Gras pageantry, Wolff avoids treating his topic as an “us vs. them” scenario. Better still, charming anecdotes such as a former mayor’s attempt to score an invitation to a drag ball serve as a welcome counterbalance to the obviously grimmer—but undoubtedly necessary—stories of police raids and AIDS fatalities.

At a relatively brief eighty minutes, the film could have afforded to explore the krewe scene’s impact on a wider swath of the LGBT community. Granted, its title speaks to Wolff’s intended focus, but it might have been revelatory to hear from a lesbian or anyone who identifies as queer to some extent, in addition to the already insightful interviews with gay men. Still, The Sons of Tennessee Williams remains an enlightening look at a triumphant piece of LGBT history and an affirmative reminder of the potential for civil rights wherever they’re needed.