Nightbitch Review – Provocative, Challenging, Reality Meets Escapism

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Category: Film

Published on Monday, 11 November 2024 10:17

Written by Janet Walker

Nightbitch, from Searchlight Pictures, presents a fantasy fueled dramady which blends reality and the need to escape the mundane boredom of suburban life, a failing marriage, coupled with the brain numbing experience of early child rearing.

The film begins with a walk through a grocery store, as the camera focuses on two unruly children, grabbing food from shelves and throwing it in the cart. The it cuts to mother, played by six-time Academy Award nominee Amy Adams, living the suburban nightmare, with a continual repeat of the same actions, each day. By the time the mundane has been established we have entered the mind-numbing zone with her.

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We travel through her routine of what has become her life. We also understand she gave up her artistic career when she had her son, played by Arleigh Patrick Snowden and Emmett James Snowden.  If she were in corporate America anywhere, giving up that career would be a welcome relief, as it is, she is reduced from someone interesting and creative to an empty, unhappy, desperately lonely, caregiver, and while she loves her son, she has nothing other than the mommy and me crowd, which she refuses to even enter into their world for fear of becoming the impression she has of them, true or not.

As she spends time in the local library, she finds a book on mythology that explains in some ancient civilizations the main caregiver would transform into an animal. We begin to see certain transformations, which are disgusting, these scenes should have been left on the cutting room floor. However, once she gives herself over to both her fantasies that she is becoming a wild dog, she begins to include her son in them, which works and doesn't work, as she encourages her son to eat from a clean, never used, dog bowl (doesn't work) and sleep in a dog's bed, instead of the parents' bed, (which works).

Of course, in a scene reminiscent of Stephen King's Pet Cemetery, she runs through the night digging in the dirt, embracing her animal instincts, and when she returns home, she is showering and her husband, played by Scoot McNairy, who is home for the weekend, opens the shower and is captivated that she is so dirty, and steps into the shower with her. Their love life has been on pause also, and now as she has returned to her pre-marriage free spirited, dirty girl, days, the passion has returned.

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As Nightbitch is all about escapism, we see vividly the means that these characters escape, as the wife, escapes through her fantasies, which allow her to run free, and her husband escapes the reality of his marriage and parenting duties though his traveling job, which brings him home on the weekends, when each day is a special day filled with family outings and fun.

I do want to add, this film also highlights the sacrifice of parents who, with help or without, deserve more thanks they will ever receive.

Back in 2022, Nightbitch was provocative, a provocative title, story, and with a six-time academy award nominated actress attached, presented itself as a vehicle that could boost the sagging box office still reeling from pandemic era shutdowns. So, at the time the film was greenlit, it was an enticing and even tantalizing, a possible fantasy-fueled dark comedy vehicle that would generate enough buzz for a strong first weekend.

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Unfortunately, in the time since, and in production, the themes explored are misogynistic, having the female in submission, eating, on all fours, from a dog's bowl, and the notion that pregnancy weight gain is because she eats uncontrollably. Killing animals has benchmarks of serial killers, which presents each of the female leads who confess to animal cruelty as mentally unstable. The film explained typical attitudes, all the pleasure none of the maintenance, and body shaming, especially during another shower scene, where her husband, for 30 minutes is caring for their son, and he appears incapable of even going to the store to get milk, and bursts into her only private moment to complain over the milk.

There are moments, in the transformation, that should have been abandoned and at least tempered, the director, Marielle Heller, has crossed the boundaries of realism and really, who wants to see it. Which, to me, lends itself to the misogynistic themes, that are hidden, like Easter eggs throughout the film.

Amy Adams gave herself over to this role and delivered a provocative, challenging, and convincing performance, and her talent was wasted. I felt, during the screening, as I wondered if this was the best her agent could deliver, that she had somehow fallen out of favor. However, as the film generates such a strong response from this reviewer, I believe others will see it also. Her performance will definitely generate conversation.

Nightbitch opens December 6, 2024. Skip it.

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Country: U.S.

Language: English.

Runtime: 99 minutes.

Director: Marielle Heller.

Producer: Amy Adams, Anne Carey, Marielle Heller, Sur Naegle, Stacy O'Neil, Christina Oh.

Executive Producer: Allison Rose Carter, Megan Ellison, Adam Paulsen, Sammy Scher, Rachel Yoder.

Writer: Marielle Heller, based on the novel by Rachel Yoder.

Cast: Amy Adams, Scoot McNairy, Arleigh Patrick Snowden, Emmett James Snowden, Zoe Chao, Mary Holland, Archana Rajan, Jessica Harper, Nate Heller, Darius De La Cruz, Ella Thomas, Stacey Swift, Garrett C. Phillips, Adrienne Rose White, Michaela Baham, Kerry O'Malley, Roslyn Gentle, Michael Andrew Baker, Judith Moreland, Caden Green, Zarah Beverly.

Janet Walker is the publisher, founder, and sole owner of Haute-Lifestyle.com. A graduate of New York University, she has been covering international news through the Beltway Insider, a weekly review of the nation’s top stories, for more than a decade.  A general beat writer/reporter and entertainment/film critic, she is also an accomplished news/investigative news/crime reporter and submitted for Pulitzer Prize consideration "Cops Conspire to Deep Six Sex Assaults" in the Breaking News Category and was persuaded to withdraw the submission. Ms. Walker has completed five screenplays, "The Six Sides of Truth," "The Assassins of Fifth Avenue," "The Wednesday Killer," "The Manhattan Project," and the sci-fi thriller "Project 13: The Last Day." She is a member of the Los Angeles Press Club, the National Writers Union, and the International Federation of Journalists.