An understated, graphic-novel-esque take on desire and connection is threaded through with humour
An affecting – and apparently real – home-birth sequence comprises the last 15 minutes of Egyptian film-maker Sam Abbas’s otherwise fictional short feature. The sudden onrush of biological imperative gives this footage a gripping undeniability and focus that this loosely collaged account of a foundering Brooklyn relationship has been searching for – or perhaps that its characters are dodging.
It’s not the film’s central couple, though, who are having a child. Present in the apartment is Jamie (Poorna Jagannathan), who with Jenna (Maya Kazan) appears to be acting as a doula, a kind of spiritual guide, to the parents-to-be. Jenna strongly resembles Tess (Nikohl Boosheri), the partner with whom we see Jenna sharing her life in the film’s initial section. They take pottery classes, traipse through an exhibition, order antidepressants; all activities grasping for completeness but undertaken with an undertow of disquiet.