Rating: 4/5
Anti-Criterion Challenge 2024 | 29/52 | A karaoke scene
A baby tooth sinks to the bottom of a glass of water under an orchestral cover of The Stranglers’ “Golden Brown.”
It’s Tuesday morning. Milla is at the train station in her school uniform. A feral man named Moses pushes past her and nearly collides with the train. Her nose bleeds, so he drags her to the ground, takes off his shirt, and holds it to her nose. He tells her he’s been evicted and needs money. She offers him 50, but he has to do something for her.
Moses gives Milla a haircut — shave on the sides, just like his — before introducing him to Henry and Anna, her parents. Milla is 16, and Moses is 23. Anna has taken too much Xanax and Zoloft, as well as some blue things. Henry is just happy Milla is home and safe. Anna freaks and Moses leaves, 50 in hand.
It’s at this point that the movie gives us a hint at why Milla’s parents are so permissive. Milla had cancer and is in remission. But things get messier when, one night, Anna catches Moses robbing them and taking prescription drugs. Milla comes in, hair has fallen out. She’s had a remission and is getting chemo again. Henry wants to call the police — but when they realize how happy Moses makes Milla, they back off.
This is the worst possible parenting I can imagine.
In case it isn’t clear, this movie is hilarious. It’s a sense of humor for which you’re either on board or will only sour the experience.
It helps to have Ben Mendelsohn and Essie Davis, who are tremendous actors. Eliza Scanlen proved she could play an unpredictable teenager in Sharp Objects. Toby Wallace is convincing as an Aussie pillhead, and gives a remarkable performance.
Moses and Milla have that classic avoidant/anxious attachment style. Moses comes and goes as he pleases. Milla is hooked on his mysterious ways and wants, more than anything, for him to stay near her.
The film also follows Henry’s fixation on a pregnant woman named Toby. Henry, a psychiatrist, needs to fix people. Her prescribes all sorts of drugs for Anna that don’t seem to help. His daughter is dying and falling for a drug addict, and there’s nothing he can do about it. In a world where everyone’s problems are not easily solvable, Toby needs someone to change a lightbulb.
This script has all the trademarks of a “quirky indie comedy-drama,” but Shannon Murphy’s direction smooths out many quirks. Not all of it — Milla is sometimes wacky for the sake of it, and the movie doesn’t care too much about what pill addiction looks like — but enough to keep this from being a cloying disaster.
It also helps that the dynamics at play make some sense to me. My younger half-sister was born with a physical disability that made one side of her body significantly weaker than the other. My mother was permissive with her because of it and because my sister was the only daughter she had. So, when my sister met a boy seven years her senior, she was worried but also relieved that my sister could meet and fall in love with someone. It helps that he isn’t a drug addict, at least to my knowledge.
From the outside, you wonder what the hell my mom is thinking. But when you grow up with a daughter full of love and misery, you don’t want to take away that chance at happiness.
My projection is probably making the movie better than it is. Also, my love of Aussie/Kiwi accents probably obscured some glaring flaws. But this movie charmed my pants off. Is that a phrase? It charmed me and got right under my skin.
Also, the soundtrack fucking rules. Tune-Yards followed by Donnie & Joe Emerson? And “Just Another Diamond Day” by Vashti Bunyan?? Fuck off.