"Here is a psychological horror-comedy of postnatal depression and lonely parental stress, like a flip-side to Eraserhead or Rosemary's Baby; it's a scary movie with a heroine shot almost solely in looming closeup but instead of supernatural apparitions, there are simply the banal problems of childcare and no time to deal with them. It's also a film about therapy and transference when there's nothing left to transfer."
"The girl is intubated via a feeding machine that must be carted around with her, especially to the day-care hospital whose brusque doctor in charge (played by Mary Bronstein in cameo) supervises group therapy sessions that blandly reassure the parents present that all this is not their fault, while curtly reprimanding Linda for her failure to turn up to appointments and to discuss her daughter's failure to gain the weight necessary for the tube to be removed."
A psychotherapist named Linda struggles with postnatal depression and parental isolation while her husband is away and her infant requires constant medical feeding. The infant's face remains hidden until the end, suggesting the child's identity functions as a pervasive, blank caregiving problem. Linda relies on weed, wine and ineffective exchanges with an impatient colleague, and group therapy sessions at the hospital offer bland reassurance while admonishing her absences. Cinematic choices favor looming close-ups and everyday childcare crises rather than supernatural horror. The production is written and directed by Mary Bronstein and produced by Ronald Bronstein and Josh Safdie, culminating in a sprint toward breakdown.
Read at www.theguardian.com
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