Plenty of films great and small have gone spelunking in the quiet desperation of middle-class suburban motherhood, but few have plumbed the milieu with more consistently uncomfortable results than writer-director Debra Eisenstadt’s “Imaginary Order.” Abrasive and often bleakly funny, the film is anchored by an unrestrained lead performance from Wendi McLendon-Covey as a Type A PTA mom who engineers her own absurd downfall, one well-intentioned decision at a time. Admirably acted and powered by a loopy internal rhythm, the film nonetheless wears out its welcome long before it’s done inflicting indignities on its heroine, arriving at its main point early and then repeating it again and again.
Cathy (McLendon-Covey) is a stay-at-home mom whose loneliness and sublimated regret at giving up her career are obvious from virtually the first frame. After quick-cut montages of her arduous morning ablutions set to Chopin sonatas, we watch Cathy as she helicopter-parents...
Cathy (McLendon-Covey) is a stay-at-home mom whose loneliness and sublimated regret at giving up her career are obvious from virtually the first frame. After quick-cut montages of her arduous morning ablutions set to Chopin sonatas, we watch Cathy as she helicopter-parents...
- 1/27/2019
- by Andrew Barker
- Variety Film + TV
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