Shiva Baby, 2020
Danielle (Rachel Sennott) leaves a steamy (and paid!) encounter with her sugar daddy, Max (Danny Deferarri) to attend a funeral event at the home of family friends. However things go quickly off the rails when Max arrives at the house. Under the inquiring eyes of numerous older relatives and family friends, Danielle's life is picked apart. Danielle's childhood friend and rival Maya (Molly Gordon) is also at the party, only heightening the tension.
I'm sorry, but this movie is classified as comedy-drama, when clearly it is a horror film.
Okay, to be fair, the film deliberately plays many sequences as if they are a horror film, which is probably the most effective comedic aspect. Danielle stumbles through the gathering to the plucking and bowing of disjoint and jangling violins, as relatives lurch out at her from doorways like something out of a creature feature. The screams of an upset baby punctuate many of the scenes.
There's so much to unpack with this film, and the interactions are incredibly loaded with layers of meaning and different power dynamics.
At a very basic level, it's interesting that Danielle, in a very literal way, is always the one seen as "making the mess", even when others are clearly to blame or at least a significant part of it. Everything about Danielle's life is picked apart: her weight, her job prospects, her (lack of a) husband/love life. She is bisexual, which her parents have decided to refer to as "experimenting". There is something particularly ruthless about the way that Danielle (and Maya) are subjected to constant comparison.
Something that the film really nails is the flutter of mixed messages that young people can receive. Danielle is at once overly babied and mocked for not being more of an adult. She's told repeatedly that people are proud of her and believe in her, while the next moment everyone pulls confused faces about her studying "feminism". It's definitely true that Danielle has fallen into a trap that many people do: she has gone to college but she doesn't have any specific direction for her studies or plans for what to do after she graduates. I think something that the film observes very keenly is that Danielle is kept to busy defending her choices to others, that she hasn't had a chance to look critically at her choices herself.
I also thought that the character dynamics of the movie were portrayed very well. Danielle's relationships with Maya, Max, and her parents all evolve and gain depth and poignancy as the film progresses. In fact, to discuss what I loved most about this aspect of the film would be to give away key plot points and developments.
During this film I was like "Man, this is getting really intense!!" only to realize that I was a mere 20 minutes into it. As someone who genuinely suffers when forced to watch a character endure repeated humiliation and put-downs, I wasn't sure I'd feel good about watching the full 80 minutes. But there is just so much good character work, and the saving grace of the film is the journey that Danielle goes through during the gathering. I even found the ending kind of uplifting and sweet.
I can already hear the criticisms that Danielle isn't "likable" (similar to some of the criticisms of
Frances Ha), or whatever. But I don't think that she's meant to just be someone we like. She's someone who, trapped in a cycle of coddling and criticism, has not made the most of the advantages given her. The funeral gathering becomes a sort of trial by fire whereby all of her mistakes and regrets are laid bare in front of a well-meaning but also unsparing audience. Everything that she does is understandable, even as it's frustrating. It's not "Why would she do that?" so much as it is "Oh, sweetie!!! Don't do
that!".
I also found the film genuinely funny, with most of the humor admittedly arising from the antics of the older set of folks at the gathering. "Tell me: does this bathroom have an operating fan, or a window that can be opened?" or "And off we go! Like a flock of turkeys!".
Anyway, I'd be more than delighted to have a spoiler-text loaded discussion with someone else who's seen this one.
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