Tuesday
Here's a "Tuesday" review on a Wednesday.
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“Tuesday” (in theaters beginning Friday, June 14) is a tricky film to review. It’s a fairly simple story, but still manages to spring some surprises that are better left unspoiled.
Tuesday (Lola Petticrew) is our titular teenage protagonist. She’s been suffering with terminal cancer for quite some time and is at death’s door. Death (voiced by Arinzé Kene) comes in the form of a macaw that can talk and alter its size. Tuesday is ready to die, but asks Death for a short reprieve so she can say goodbye to her mother Zora (Julia Louis-Dreyfus).
Zora, understandably, is having trouble grappling with her daughter’s impending demise. She’s stopped working, but still goes out every day if for no other reason than to leave the house. Zora’s been making ends meet by selling off almost all of their worldly possessions.
Tuesday, who’s spent the afternoon listening to Ice Cube’s “It Was a Good Day” and vaping weed with Death, introduces her mother to the macaw. Zora attempts to intervene on her daughter’s behalf. To divulge much else would be doing this movie a disservice.
“Tuesday” is the feature debut of Croatian writer/director Daina Oniunas-Pusić. It’s likely going to be too sad and too strange for general audiences, but there’s plenty to recommend here for more adventurous filmgoers. This is probably the best dramatic work I’ve ever seen Louis-Dreyfus do. Zora is simultaneously selfish and selfless and Louis-Dreyfus plays these varying notes fascinatingly. Petticrew, impressively, holds their own against their more seasoned co-star and makes Tuesday an entirely sympathetic figure. These performers are strongly supported through Kene’s haunting vocal performance and by Leah Harvey as the put-upon Nurse Billie.
I was also impressed by the visual effects from Axis Studios, DNEG and ReDefine. I imagine this was a pretty low-budget production, but the way in which these artists realized and rendered Death and other fantastical instances is not only convincing but cool as well.
“Tuesday” is a supernatural drama from the good folks at A24 and BBC Film and these companies’ fingerprints are all over the flick in that it’s both weird and dryly British. I laughed a little and cried A LOT. Come for Louis-Dreyfus (she’s the goods and you’ve never seen her in this mode) and stay for Oniunas-Pusić – she certainly shows enough filmmaking potential that I’m certainly curious to see whatever she does next.