Kids, it’s always important to meet your prospective in-laws before you get married. That’s the chief lesson of The Front Room. Most in-laws, even the unpleasant ones, aren’t dealbreakers for a relationship, but the mother-in-law in this latest horror film from A24 is very much an exception. Like the movie she is in, she is a thoroughly nasty piece of work.
Based loosely on Susan Hill’s short story, the film begins with heavily pregnant Belinda (Brandy Norwood) leaving her job as a non-tenured anthropology professor because her department is still treating her like the adjunct she used to be, which is to say like crap. Her public-defender husband Norman (Andrew Burnap) straight-up panics when he receives a call from his elderly stepmother Solange (Kathryn Hunter) that his father is dying, and he refuses to see the old man on his deathbed in order to avoid having to deal with her. When they finally do meet in person, Solange offers to give the married couple her fortune on the condition that she moves in with them, and Norman and Belinda are too deep in debt to turn her away. The couple have decked out their front room as a nursery for the baby, but Solange immediately claims it for herself, citing the fact that she can’t go up and down the stairs.
This is the first feature by Max and Sam Eggers, the brothers of Robert Eggers from The Witch and The Lighthouse. Rather than seek out horror in the distant past like Robert does, the Eggers brothers have set this story in the present day. The film emerges as a throwback in their hands, as they shoot this like a low-budget 1970s or ’80s horror movie with pasty light and practical effects. (I’ll point out, though, that even the most adventurous filmmakers back then wouldn’t have dared deal with an interracial relationship.) Marcelo Zarvos’ theremin-heavy score contributes to the feeling of a retro exercise as well.
The movie’s promotional materials are touting Solange as the most racist old white lady that you could ever wish not to meet. She is that, as she proudly displays her membership in the Daughters of the Confederacy, calls Belinda “uppity” to her face, and brags about her family’s history with the Klan. However, while the racism isn’t the least of it, it is just one of many awful things about her. Solange is incontinent as well, and the movie fairly revels in the massive amounts of her pee and poop that Belinda has to clean up. She speaks in tongues, criticizes the couple’s choice of baby name, invites her church group to the house without telling anyone, sows discord between her stepson and his wife, and fakes seizures for attention. When Belinda declares that it’s her house, Solange pounds her cane on the floor and declares herself the owner since she pays the bills. Norman banishes her to her room, so she keeps the couple up all night by screaming, “Why can’t I just die!” Somehow she finds out about the stillborn son that Norman and Belinda had a few years ago and tells Belinda that she lost her baby because she didn’t accept Jesus. This isn’t the worst thing Solange does. It might not even be in the top 3. The 5’1”, 67-year-old Hunter is American-born, British-raised, and particularly renowned for her skills at movement. (You saw her as the witches in The Tragedy of Macbeth and the Parisian brothel madam in Poor Things.) Here she makes Solange into a memorable monster, pounding up and down the house’s wooden floors with walking canes in each hand.
Things only get worse after the baby is born, and the Eggerses execute a harrowing montage of Belinda endlessly feeding and cleaning up after both her daughter and Solange. This really isn’t a horror movie about a racist old woman. It’s a horror movie about a young Black mother who’s falling apart under the strains of parenthood, and as such it’s a pretty good example of a film that we don’t have enough of. Belinda is especially frayed since she’s left alone with Solange, with Norman constantly away at work pursuing a high-paying defense-attorney job that he keeps swearing is just within reach. The movie sticks close to Belinda’s point of view, and we can’t trust everything we see because Belinda is so sleep-deprived and has such vivid nightmares when she does sleep. This part of the movie works because Brandy manages to hold her own against the fire-breathing white supremacist dragon opposite her. It may not be top-level stuff, but I recall the callow performances she gave in the 1990s to capitalize off her music fame, and she has come a long way. When Belinda finally snaps and takes back her home, it leads to the grubby but satisfying resolution of The Front Room, which leaves you feeling bad but also makes you want to shout “Glory Hallelujah!”
The Front Room
Starring Brandy Norwood and Kathryn Hunter. Written and directed by Max and Sam Eggers, based on Susan Hill’s short story. Rated R.
