This was one of the contenders of Awards Season I was looking forward to the most, having seen clips and Mark Kermode talking about it on BBC News, The Film Review. Basically, a happy couple in Boston, Martha (Oscar, BAFTA and Golden Globe nominated Vanessa Kirby), an executive, and Sean (Shia LaBeouf), a construction worker, are expecting their first child. Martha goes into labour at their home and Sean calls their midwife, Barbara. Another midwife, Eva Woodward (Molly Parker), is sent in Barbara's place, as she is unavailable. Martha struggles with nausea and pain during contractions, but Eva is supportive, and Sean helps to keep her calm. When Martha reaches ten centimetres, Eva realises the baby's heart rate has dropped dangerously low. Sean asks Eva if they are safe to continue and Eva tells Sean to call an ambulance. Martha eventually gives birth to a baby girl who at first seems healthy. But shortly after, Eva notices the baby is turning blue and attempts to revive her as she stops breathing. Unfortunately, the child goes into cardiac arrest and dies before the ambulance arrive. The following month, Martha and Sean meet with a coroner. Sean is eager to find out what went wrong, while Martha is reluctant. They learn the cause of death has not yet been established but are told they were able to determine that the baby was in a low-oxygen environment. Proceedings against Eva have already started. Sean leaves, overcome with emotion, while Martha is almost emotionless and stays to talk to the coroner. She wants to donate the baby's body to science. Martha and Sean's relationship continues to be strained. The relationship between Martha and her mother, Elizabeth (Ellen Burstyn), a wealthy Jewish woman, and Holocaust survivor, also becomes strained. Elizabeth wants to have a burial and funeral for the baby, Both Martha and Sean remain deeply depressed. Sean later starts to have an affair, having sex with Martha's cousin, Suzanne (Sarah Snook). He is a former drug addict, he has been sober for almost seven years, but he starts using cocaine. Suzanne is the attorney prosecuting Eva; she informs Sean that a potential lawsuit against Eva could be very lucrative. A month later, at a tense family gathering at her home, Elizabeth tells Martha that she has to attend Eva's trial and blames Martha for her baby's death because she decided to have a home birth. Elizabeth then tells Sean that she never liked him before offering him a cheque for large sum of money to leave and never return. Martha drops Sean off at Logan International Airport and he leaves for Seattle. Months later, Martha testifies at Eva's trial. She is interrogated by the defence about the dangers and complications of a home birth as opposed to going to hospital, while the prosecution questions if she truly trusted Eva to do her job. After her testimony, the judge allows her to address the court. Martha finally becomes emotional about her baby, she says that no conviction or lawsuit is ever going to take away her pain, and she states Eva is not to blame for the death of her child. A month later, Martha scatters her daughter's ashes into the river from the bridge that Sean helped to build. Years later, a little girl climbs an apple tree, picks an apple, and eats it. This little girl is Martha's daughter, Lucy (Juliette Casagrande), she helps her down and they go inside together. Also starring Iliza Shlesinger as Anita Weiss, Benny Safdie as Chris, Tyrone Benskin as Judge, and Jimmie Fails as Max. Kirby gives a highly convincing performance as the middle-class mother who cannot bring herself to truly acknowledge what has happened, LeBeouf is good as her partner who goes down a dark path, and Burstyn is great as the domineering mother pressuring her daughter to take legal action. The opening twenty-four minutes is a brilliant unedited long take of a realistic labour scene, the story going forward monthly to see the aftermath of the child's death and the relationship breaking down is clever, it really draws you in, a terrific drama. Very good!
Review of Pieces of a Woman
