Birth

Directed by Jonathan Glazer, Birth follows Nicole Kidman’s Anna as she becomes convinced that her dead husband has been reincarnated as a ten-year-old boy (Cameron Bright’s Sean). It’s a fairly absurd premise that is, at the outset, employed to surprisingly compelling and mesmerizing effect by Glazer, as the filmmaker, armed with a script written alongside Jean-Claude Carrière and Milo Addica, delivers a moody, irresistibly stylish thriller that’s enhanced by its various attributes – with, especially, the raft of first-class performances and Harris Savides’ often hypnotic visuals elevating the proceedings on a regular basis. (There is, for example, a key early scene featuring a sustained closeup of Kidman’s face that’s nothing short of breathtaking.) There’s little doubt, then, that Birth‘s iron grip on the viewer’s interest and attention is loosened considerably by a meandering and increasingly outlandish midsection, and it’s disappointing to note, as a result, that the spare narrative does fizzle out rather demonstrably in the buildup to the unexpectedly neat and tidy resolution (ie there’s no ambiguity, ultimately, about what’s really going on here) – with the end result a good (but disappointingly not great) endeavor that can’t quite live up to the power of its opening stretch.

**1/2 out of ****