Obvious Child
In one of the year-end episodes of NPR’s Pop Culture Happy Hour podcast, panelist Glen Weldon picked out Obvious Child as a counterexample to the claim that 2014 was a bad year for film. The movie had already been on my list for a while at that point, but Weldon’s recommendation was another reminder to move it up in the queue, especially now that the movie is on Netflix. I’m glad I did.
Obvious Child takes its name from a 1990 Paul Simon song, one with the light, airy melody and propulsive rhythms I think of when I think of Simon’s music during that era. And, as was so common with a Paul Simon song, the lightness and danceability of the music belied the complexity of the lyrics. “The Obvious Child” is a wistful song, one about the necessity of growing up, and of facing who you turn out to be when you get there. In a lot of ways, it’s an apt title for this movie.
Jenny Slate plays a young stand-up comedienne, Donna Stern, stuck in that phase of your early twenties where you’re out in the world but don’t yet feel like an adult. After a break-up and a casual (if adorable) fling, she finds out she’s pregnant, and then decides to have an abortion. Now, this summary sounds fairly trite and simple, possibly even didactic, but Obvious Child is anything but. Rather, it’s a surprisingly nuanced and honest portrait of the mess and struggle of early adulthood. Slate is, by turns, funny and poignant, juvenile and mature, brash and vulnerable. So much of the movie hinges on her ability to give a good performance, and she more than lives up to the challenge. You’re left with something that sounds almost like an oxymoron: an abortion story that somehow manages to be a feel-good movie.
It’s not going to be for everyone, this movie. Clearly, some people will find the central tension and its resolution distasteful. But I have to say, I don’t think I’ve ever seen a movie before that deals with abortion so honestly. It’s never heavy-handed or even particularly partisan, focusing instead on the people involved and what they go through. It’s a story, not a lesson. And, in any case, there’s so much more going on: Donna’s relationship with her parents, her place in her community of friends, and, most importantly, her relationship to her own life. The real climax of the film doesn’t take place in a clinic, but in a comedy club where Donna’s stand-up becomes the vehicle for her accepting her situation and her decisions, and that those decisions are hers to make.
I can’t say for sure how you will feel about this movie, but I can say that I really enjoyed it.
Viewed: 1/16/2015 | Released: 8/29/2014 | Score: A-