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‘Saint Frances’ Film Review: Unhappy Millennial Matures While Caring for Kindergartner in Festival Fave

Empathetic indie finds everyday joys and pain in the interactions between its believable characters

| February 26, 2020 @ 2:38 PM
Saint Frances

Oscilloscope

Anyone feeling stuck in a rut will appreciate “Saint Frances,” Alex Thompson’s sensitive feature debut, which earned both the Audience and Grand Jury awards at SXSW last year. Though he focuses on one small season of one woman’s life, the details don’t go unnoticed.

Bridget (Kelly O’Sullivan, “Sirens”) is used to the patronizing pity in people’s eyes when she admits she dropped out of Northwestern after a year. When she tells them she’s 34, single, and works in a diner. When she stands in awkward silence, after someone pushes her to admit what she really wants with her life.

If she knew, maybe she’d be doing it already. Or maybe not. But either way, the issue isn’t that her meandering path is making others unhappy. After all, none of the married, professional, parenting people she knows seem especially content.

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Certainly not Annie (Lily Mojekwu) and Maya (Charin Alvarez), a Catholic, multiracial lesbian couple who hire Bridget as their nanny. Their brilliant six-year-old daughter, Frances (Ramona Edith Williams), is trying to make sense of all the chaos around her: a new baby brother, parents who fight more often, and this strange woman who is suddenly taking her to school and the park all the time.

O’Sullivan, who wrote the script, works hard to stay focused within her micro-universe. Sometimes this means the pacing is slow and the suburban-Chicago imagery feels deceptively ordinary. But the memorably empathetic depictions of everyday joys and pain are most often found in the connections between people. So a generic kitchen becomes a crucial meeting place, and a noisy playground suddenly turns into a battleground. That Bridget is lost is never in doubt; that her guideposts are the other women in her life becomes increasingly clear with each misstep and stumbling recovery.

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The filmmakers also do a nice job depicting the very millennial relationship between Bridget and Jace (Max Lipchitz), a laid-back beta-dude in his mid-20s. He suits her because they’re on the same track, despite the fact that she’s nearly a decade older. But while a lazier script or actor might leave it at that, Lipchitz gets the chance to push Jace into unexpected places.

This is clear right away, when a post-party hookup turns graphically intimate in a way rarely seen onscreen. It’s not much of a spoiler to add that Bridget soon discovers she’s pregnant, since the decision she has to make impacts her throughout the movie. What’s more surprising, and gratifying, is the determinedly practical approach to such a controversial subject. We’ve seen lots of movies in which heroines grapple at great length with abortion emotionally, but very few in which they’re allowed to approach it on their own terms with absolutely no judgment.

One of those, of course, was 2014’s beloved dramedy “Obvious Child,” which does cast a long shadow even six years later. “Saint Frances” brings to mind plenty of other festival favorites as well, given that indies about a delayed coming-of-age are hardly uncommon. But if this movie doesn’t stand out for visual or thematic originality, it does make its own quiet case through consistently empathetic self-assurance. Bridget’s approach to an unplanned pregnancy is part of her story, but it doesn’t define her, and it’s to the filmmakers’ credit that they do everything they can to expand our heavily-reinforced cultural assumptions.

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Indeed, the movie’s most notable asset is the way it resists sketching any of its main characters with a single, easy-to-grasp definition. This does make the exceptions stand out, like the designated villains who feel particularly cartoonish as they berate Maya for breastfeeding in public or belittle Bridget for taking care of other people’s children.

But every one of the little-known leads is ideally cast, and fully committed. O’Sullivan cuts Bridget’s relatable vulnerability with a realistically selfish edge, Lipchitz upends their seemingly unbalanced relationship, and Alvarez deserves a raft of offers based on her moving portrayal of a silently overwhelmed mother.

The acknowledged star, however, is Williams. A 6-year-old figure skater and pageant winner, she is the essence of wide-eyed precocity and given plenty of room to prove it. It’s hard to know yet whether she has an unusually natural and charismatic onscreen presence or a rare talent. But she is an undeniable charmer, even when required to solemnly deliver such adult-written lines as “Every woman’s body is different.”

Then again, she’s not wrong. So, too, is every woman’s experience. And “Saint Frances” never forgets it.

Sundance Portraits From A to Z: Andy Samberg to Zazie Beetz (Exclusive Photos)

  • Sundance2020 gallery split v2
  • Glenn Close, Four Good Days
  • Mila Kunis, Four Good Days
  • Rodrigo Garcia, Four Good Days
  • Toni Collette, Dream Horse
  • Euros Lyn, Dream Horse
  • Sienna Miller, Wander Darkly
  • Diego Luna, Wander Darkly
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  • Alison Brie, Horse Girl
  • Jeff Baena, Horse Girl
  • Steven Yeun, Minari
  • Yuh Jung Youn, Minari
  • Han Yeri, Minari
  • Lee Isaac Chung, Minari
  • Kelly Rowland, Bad Hair
  • Ashley Blaine Featherson, Bad Hair
  • James Van Der Beek, Bad Hair
  • Yaani King Mondschein, Bad Hair
  • Elle Lorraine, Bad Hair
  • Justin Simien, Bad Hair
  • Hatice Cengiz, The Dissident
  • Bryan Fogel, The Dissident
  • Andy Samberg, Palm Springs
  • Cristin Milioti, Palm Springs
  • Andy Samberg and Cristin Milioti, Palm Springs
  • Andy Siara, Palm Springs
  • Joe Keery, Spree
  • John DeLuca, Spree
  • Spree Director and Cast
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  • Allan Ball, Uncle Frank
  • Paul Bettany, Uncle Frank
  • Sophia Lillis, Uncle Frank
  • Peter Macdissi, Uncle Frank
  • Rachel Brosnahan, Ironbark
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  • Diane Guerrero, Blast Beat
  • Moises Arias, Blast Beat
  • Kali Uchis, Blast Beat
  • Daniel Dae Kim, Blast Beat
  • Mateo Arias, Blast Beat
  • Esteban Arango, Blast Beat
  • Lee Gelernt, The Fight
  • Brigitte Amiri, The Fight
  • THE FIGHT and Kerry Washington
  • Winston Duke, Nine Days
  • Bill Skarsgård, Nine Days
  • Zazie Beetz, Nine Days
  • Benedict Wong, Nine Days
  • Arianna Ortiz, Nine Days
  • David Rysdahl, Nine Days
  • Edson Oda, Nine days
  • Sil Lai Abrams, Drew Dixon, and Sherri Hines, On the Record
  • Gloria Steinem, The Glorias
  • Julie Taymor, The Glorias
  • Harvey Guillén, What We Do in the Shadows
  • Christopher Abbott, Possessor
  • Brandon Cronenberg, Possessor
  • Agnes Gund, Aggie
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  • Jayme Lawson, Farewell Amor
  • The Go Go's and Steve Pond
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  • Julie Nottingham, Be Water
  • Lana Wilson, Miss Americana
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  • Carey Mulligan and Emerald Fennell, Promising Young Woman
  • Maimouna Doucoure and Zangro, Cuties
  • Charlie Shotwell, Jude Law, and Oona Roche, The Nest
  • Devin France, Wendy
  • Elisabeth Moss, Shirley
  • Michael Stuhlbarg, Shirley
  • Josephine Decker, Shirley
  • Logan Lerman, Shirley
  • Brian Lazarte, McMillions
  • James Lee Hernandez, McMillions
  • Julia Garner, The Assistant
  • Kitty Green, The Assistant
  • Marquise Vilson, Sam Feder, Amy Scholder, Disclosure
  • Zeke Smith, Zackary Drucker, and Jen Richards, Disclosure
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  • David Bruckner, The Night House
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  • Mark Nelson, Spaceship Earth
  • Matt Wolf, Spaceship Earth
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