Throughout the history of the horror genre, motherhood has been confronted in the most brutal and honest ways possible. Life-shattering loss as shown by Julie Christie in Nicolas Roeg’s Don’t Look Now (1973), generational trauma through the eyes of Toni Collette in Ari Aster’s debut knockout Hereditary (2018), and postpartum depression manifesting as a monster in Jennifer Kent’s The Babadook (2014) are all brilliant examinations of motherhood in horror. While being referential to obvious sources like Frankenstein, director and co-writer Laura Moss has, with co-writer Brendan J. O’Brien, created what I believe is a unique and fascinating new look at a different kind of mother’s love in Birth/Rebirth.

There’s little that can go wrong with a two-hander that includes the absolutely flawless Marin Ireland (The Dark and the Wicked) and Judy Reyes (Smile), but in lesser hands, the simplicity of Birth/Rebirth could have fallen flat. When the strange and brilliant Rose Casper (Ireland) abducts the corpse of a young girl for an experimental procedure, the girl’s mother Celie (Reyes) follows the trail to Rose’s apartment, discovering what, to anyone else, would be a horrific sight, but to Celie signifies a hopeful path forward.

So much of Birth/Rebirth involves surrendering to a baser instinct, but not one that’s purely survival, it goes far beyond that. It’s a refusal to accept death after it’s already happened, an acceptance that what comes back might not be good, but it’s better than the void left behind. Our instincts require a fight that isn’t allowed to Celie’s daughter with the suddenness of her death, but the fight is inherited by Celie postmortem, the instinct to do the worst thing she could ever do and allow herself the feeling of vindication in doing it. 

Rose is difficult to identify with, she lacks a bedside manner when dealing with those who have lost loved ones, but her scientific mind is one that Celie later learns to appeal to, even manipulate, once things start going to the dogs. Celie is a loving mother who suffers an unimaginable pain with the loss of her child, and her unpredictable behavior as she’s secretly joining forces with Rose is easily written off by those around her as grief. Both Rose and Celie are generally isolated when we’re first introduced to them. It’s apparent that Celie’s world revolves around her daughter, Lila (a fantastic performance by A.J. Lister), and Rose doesn’t seem to have a person around her that she wouldn’t be willing to involve in her plight for the discovery of a reanimation that sticks.

These complex characters are the kinds that lady actors dream of. The audience will forgive a lot when a story is written with boldness and thought, and while in other films it’s too easy to spend the runtime watching a character grapple with the should/shouldn’t nature of playing with death, Rose and Celie find a shared obsession, as well as an unexpected companionship, when their motivations collide, and the full force of their combined powers is beautiful and terrifying to observe. Birth/Rebirth is an understated film that utilizes the breathtaking talent of Ireland and Reyes and tells a familiar story through a completely sparse and understated lens.

Birth/Rebirth is available now on Shudder

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