"birth/rebirth" an effectively upsetting, very well-acted, deeply fucked-up take on "Frankenstein"

birth/rebirth (2023)

Writer-director Laura Moss and co-writer Brendan J. O’Brien’s “birth/rebirth” is an effective motherly interpretation of the classic “Frankenstein” story. Combining body horror and morality with close attention to medical accuracy, this is one upsetting and deeply fucked-up horror film with two excellent lead performances. 

Marin Ireland plays Dr. Rose Casper, a cold, antisocial pathologist who has a great relationship with cadavers — no one has to talk. When she’s not working, she’s still working and experimenting with reanimating the dead. Just as Bronx single mom and maternity nurse Celie Morales (Judy Reyes) loses her 6-year-old daughter Lila (A.J. Lister) to a fatal case of bacterial meningitis, the two women end up meeting in unlikely circumstances. Where the film goes from there should be left to the viewer’s discovery.

Believe me or not, “birth/rebirth” can be often darkly funny, but it clearly isn’t some wacky co-parenting farce. This is disturbing stuff about reversing the nature of death, and how both women react to this idea is what makes the film so fascinating and chilling. For Rose, it’s an experiment toward science. For Celie, it’s about getting her daughter back. In a way, the real Frankenstein’s monster being stitched together isn’t Lila but how these two women’s individual traits bleed into the other. They complement each other, but then they also become one. Read the full review at GuyAtTheMovies.com

Grade: B

IFC Films and Shudder are releasing “birth/rebirth” (98 min.) in theaters on August 18, 2023, followed by a Shudder streaming release on November 10, 2023.