Oh Boy, The Front Room…

Just saw this movie on HBO Max I want to start with what I liked. Brandy is beautiful, full stop. The actors did a superb job. All three of the main leads played their parts well despite a couple of scenes of cringe (like Brandy screaming for the old people around her speaking in tongues and gripping her belly to stop… whole sequence felt like a Tubi thriller). So that’s about all about all I liked. Now for writing decisions that made no sense. Brandy was the valedictorian of her class and can only land a role as an adjunct professor at college and is still losing shifts to lesser experienced teachers? I don’t know maybe that’s realistic, I’ve never gone for that job. Then the husband VEHEMENTLY objects to the stepmom moving in, but Brandy who’s never met this woman and sees the distress she causes her husband coerces him into letting her move in…. Okay she’s giving them money, very weak reasoning when her husbands a lawyer (even if just a public defender) and she JUST left her job. I mean she would’ve had to go on paternity leave soon anyway so it’s not like they wouldn’t have had to preplan for one income in the house. The thing about the baby’s room being downstairs initially and not the room upstairs from the parents is the weakest moment of writing to me. What real life person would set up their nursery on a different floor for a newborn? Because they had a stillborn before? Ridiculous reasoning. That’s just dumb from a teacher and a lawyer. Then this lady is rude off bat but not overtly racist in words and actions until at least that first dinner and they mention her racist roots but it seemed like such a weird thing to include. I mean is her main issue that she’s a batshit crazy possessive religious zealot or is the point of contention the racism. It just felt like the movie was trying to include and tackle too many issues for how basic the plot was. My final gripe is the character arc of the husband. He went from not wanting the stepmom there believing she was an evil person but then starts believing and defending her against his wife, while his wife acts like he needs to stay home from work and step up in taking care of this woman like she’s not the one who argued with him initially for her to move in? Loved The Lighthouse but this is a mess of a script from the Eggers brothers.