The Front Room (2024)
"Do you fear God?"
""No.""
"Then fear me."
Genuinely have not seen such a bad movie in a while, and it's A24 nonetheless, which is so unfortunate and hurts me; however, I suppose there has to be a last place on the list, in which I have absolutely no problem or no shame in listing this one as one of the worst.
The movie is decent in it's concept and I actually picked up on some of the symbolism that I would assume the director is going for, such as her singing the French national anthem at the end and being from Haiti, where there are a lot of French-speakers. It's unfortunate that this film was directed by the Eggers twins, whereas Robert Eggers has such an iconic and masterful filmography. The twins? This movie was bad enough for me to want to not watch another one made by them entirely.
I feel bad, because Brandy and Kathryn Hunter do an extremely amazing job at portraying their characters in this movie. Belinda's constant worrying but also wanting to give Solange the benefit of the doubt, and the absolute unhinged-ness that Kathryn Hunter brings to the screen as a deranged, radical, racist old person is absolute talent. They absolutely nailed their roles and excuted it well, in which I want to make sure in writing this that nothing that was wrong with this film (which was a lot) was because of them or their acting. The whole issue with this movie comes down to the screenwriting and directing in itself.
This film, as someone else mentioned, doesn't really seem to go anywhere or serve any purpose. I'll be the first to say that I don't need a film to have a deeper meaning or explain what life means through symbolic gestures, but it didn't even entertain me. It actually did quite the opposite, and had this film not been A24 and I'd been with friends, I would've gotten up and walked out. The film is so absolutely vulgar and disgusting. I know that it's meant for shock and that it plays a crucial part in the storyline of the film, blah blah blah. It was so overdone and distasteful, which one can argue is the whole point, but I had a whole entire quesadilla snuck into the theater, where I didn't even bother finishing the last piece because of how disgusting over half the scenes were in this movie.
The movie can ultimately be summarized as: don't trust a mid white man that's making an excuse for a racist and if you're going to deal with a problem on your own, do it before she's shitting and pissing all over your entire house. This movie was such an absolute miss for me, the only reason I gave it 0.5 stars at all was due to Brandy and Kathryn Hunter doing such an amazing job with their roles and me knowing that they're trying their hardest. I will absolutely not be watching this one again and I don't think that you could pay me to. If I did, I would use it as motivation to skip a meal and as an opportunity to take a 1 hour and 26 minute nap.