One of the most surprising films from last year, Obvious Child looks like a romantic comedy from the outset but the story goes down so many interesting avenues that by the end of it you aren’t sure what to label it. And that’s a good thing because what writer/director Gillian Robespierre has concocted here, with star Jenny Slate, is delightfully human and refreshingly real. Slate plays aspiring comedian Donna Stern who, after a nasty breakup and subsequent one-night stand, discovers that she is pregnant. Like I said before, a lot of the themes and plot points in Obvious Child are well-known tropes (unwanted pregnancy, the one-night-stand-with-a-heart-of-gold, etc.), but the approaches to each are new and not always safe. People might know Jenny Slate as the girl who was cut from Saturday Night Live after one season (and one embarrassing F-bomb utterance), but after her nuanced performance in Obvious Child, I have a feeling people are going to start to forget her growing pains and start anticipating her future projects.
Obvious Child
Obvious Child
80%
Bottom Line One of the most surprising films from last year, Obvious Child looks like a romantic comedy from the outset but the story goes down so many interesting avenues that by the end of it you aren't sure what to label it.