*Premise spoilers.*
This was a Jodie Whittaker film I missed during my original Countdown to Thirteen reviews, because I couldn’t find it anywhere. But just looking at the poster on IMDb intrigued me. Fast forward to my renewed love for Brett Goldstein after my Ted Lasso rewatch and my discovery that he’s also in this movie! (Fun fact: pre-Ted Lasso, Goldstein guest starred on an episode of Doctor Who with Jodie Whittaker as well. It was wild when I first rewatched “The Tsuranga Conundrum” and realized that was him!) I was glad to see it popped up on one of the free streaming sites.
As she nears 30, Anna doesn’t have a whole lot Figured Out. She’s living in her mom’s shed, where she spends her time making oddball films using DIYed odds and ends. Nothing in her life is very stable or responsible, and people are constantly reminding her of that. In truth, she’s still struggling with the death of her twin brother and doesn’t know how to get her life together on her own.
Between the homemade creations and shoestring films, The Science of Sleep came to mind, although I’d say this movie isn’t as weird or wild as that film. It’s not quite as inventive as it wants to be, but it’s pretty good. Although Anna comes by her quirks honestly—the movies are something she and Billy used to do together—it’s quickly evident how much she’s retreating into them, either as a means of coping with her grief or as a way to keep others at a distance.
But try as she might, Anna can’t stay alone. Her mother continually hounds her to start adulting better, and when an old friend comes back into town, Anna is dragged out into the world. This surrounds her with others who start nudging her out of her defense mechanisms, such as a little boy who’s acting up out of his own hurt and an awkward friend who’d like to be something more.
The latter, by the way, is where Brett Goldstein comes in. He plays Brendan, a local guy who has a thing for Anna but is at a loss for how to show that. He does things like show her the “knob” carrot he found or ramble on about the Greek gods—when he realizes he’s compared her to Dionysus, he hastily adds, “Dionysus is the good one. Most people want to be Dionysus.” He’s a goofy but sweet character who’s very unlike Roy Kent, which is fun to watch.
As Anna, Whittaker is at the center of the film. I think she does well with conveying Anna’s sense of arrested development—in part, she’s still bound up in the death of her brother and doesn’t know how to move forward, but she’s also deliberating running away from people’s expectations of her. She’s a little shiftless, a little unreliable, and a little distractible. I can see why she might be tough to deal with, but at the same time, I get why she’s the way that she is.
She likes puns—her shed has various names, including “Dawn of the Shed” and “Right Shed Fred.” She loves giving things faces, drawing them on everything from egg cartons to knots in wood to her own thumbs. (Oh yeah, and she microwaves her just-washed bra when she needs to dry it in a hurry.) She’s indifferent to a lot of things that most people find important, and she clings to little details that might seem insignificant to others. Emotion comes over her in waves, going long periods with a mask of sullenness or apathy and suddenly sinking into a fresh morass of grief.
Accent Watch
Northern—sounds like Whittaker’s native accent.
Recommend
In General – I think so. It’s not a knockout, but it’s a nice little film that approaches its characters with specificity.
Jodie Whittaker – Sure. Whittaker does well navigating the shifts between off-kilter evasion and stripped-down honesty, and I like seeing her and Goldstein play off each other.
Warnings
Sexual references, language, drinking/smoking, and thematic elements.
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