If I Had Legs I’d Kick You pulverizes you with stress for 113 minutes and doesn’t let up until the credits roll. It’s an ironic description, considering many have described motherhood in the same way. Mary Bronstein’s second feature, takes an Uncut Gems approach to parenting (Benny Safdie produced this film), showing her audiences the dark side of the “most natural job in the world.”
Rose Byrne plays Linda, a therapist and mother of an unnamed child with debilitating eating aversions that keep her out of school and in an outpatient treatment center. Her husband is gone on a two-month work trip, all too happy to be absent and to criticize her over the phone. With her daughter’s progress declining and the program’s doctors riding her, there’s not much more Linda can handle. Of course, if Bronstein obliged her character’s needs we wouldn’t have much of a film.
When the mother and daughter duo come home one day, they find the house has flooded due to an enormous and ominous hole looming over the primary bedroom’s ceiling. Resigned to a seedy beachside hotel, Linda takes the time while her child is sleeping to drink, smoke, and ignore her troubles away. She will leave her child in the middle of the night to check on the house repairs or to get a break. While at the motel, she deals with a young judgemental goth receptionist (Ivy Wolk) and the friendly maintenance man (A$AP Rocky) who eventually joins in on her drug fuel escapes.
Because her husband (Christian Slater) is so absent and her daughter so demanding, Linda receives daily therapy from a colleague in the same office. Conan O’Brien is impeccably perfect in this role. He’s droll yet caring, a rule follower who checks in despite boundaries being crossed. If this role is any indication, the former talk late-night host could have a similar dramatic career to Robin Williams if he wanted — he’s that good. His character is so by the book and Linda so opposed to doing the actual work, that an increasingly hostile relationship evolves between the two of them.
Rose Bryne has never been better. She is the Energizer Bunny of If I Had Legs. She does not stop and is totally game for whatever Bronstein throws at her. The entire film rides on her shoulders and she not only meets the challenge but gives Linda the grace an audience needs to be on her side. Her performance is a great argument for compelling unlikeable female characters because of the relatability and humanity she brings to the role.
If I Had Legs I’d Kick You will be compared to the prickly motherhood films that came before it, from The Lost Daughter to last year’s underrated Nightbitch. While they share similar themes, none are as unrelenting and brutal. I wouldn’t want to watch this while pregnant or even with a toddler. While a tense ride, it doesn’t let you know how Bronstein plans to land the plane leading you to wonder where it is going. Luckily, the film is so unrelenting that the rushed slightly unsatisfied ending doesn’t leave a mark.
If I Had Legs I’d Kick You premiered at the Sundance Film Festival. It will be released by A24, most likely this year.
