Article by Giorgia Andrea Bergamasco

Translation by Cinzia Di Bucchianico

Amy Adams fills the shoes of a monstrous new mother in Marielle Heller’s latest film, based on Rachel Yoder’s homonymous novel and presented out of competition for its Italian premiere at the Torino Film Festival.

Through a story that overturns motherhood canons, whose violence and animality are boldly displayed, the director brings to life a grotesque modern fable that should not be read to children, but to their mothers. The idealisation of motherhood, which is to this very day an oppressive model for a lot of women, has a complete overturn.

Between fantasy and comedy, Nightbitch combines two narrative tones, by bringing together pungent humour, horrifying elements, and magic realism that are central in Yoder’s novel. The camera constantly lingers on the protagonist to capture the subtle expressive skills of the face that named Amy Adams one of the best performers of her generation. Fully embodying the delicate and complex emotional journey of the protagonist, the actress conveys her uneasiness, pain, anger, and loneliness through a body that, paradoxically, keeps the grace and lightness that characterise her acting.

A series of elements transfer the peculiar story of the family to a universal level. In a timeless and undefined setting, the protagonists are not given proper names: Mother, Husband, and Son can be – and are – any family. The animal metamorphosis experienced by the mother turns out to be salvific, allowing her to embrace her primordial impulses while reconciling, in her own way, her feminine and maternal roles.

Without seeming rhetorical, Heller shows how fathers and mothers experience parenthood in a different way: while women are wives and mothers, men can at most become husbands. 

This article has been published on “la Repubblica” online