Movie Review: The Front Room

There's something admirable about setting out to make a goofy little movie and getting the job done. The Front Room-a proudly campy psychological thriller which marks the directorial debut of Sam and Max Eggers (yes, they are indeed related to Robert)-pulls off this feat with relative ease. 

About 95% of The Front Room deals with the domestic power struggle that breaks out between Belinda (Brandy Norwood) and Norman (Andrew Bernap)-a married couple with a child on the way and Norman's long-estranged stepmother Solange (Kathryn Hunter) after she moves into their home following the death of Norman's father. Solange is a God-fearing woman who believes she is a vessel for the Holy Spirit who relentlessly manipulates the people around her into doing what she wants. The couple, who only took Solange in since she was willing to pay off their considerable debts, take immediate issue with her behavior-especially her casual racism towards Belinda and her leveraging the financial assistance she's providing them with to dictate everything from the way their house is decorated to how they raise their child. Things eventually escalate to the point where it's clear that this living arrangement is not going to work out and somebody in the house is going to be forced to leave one way or the other.     

Outside of the clunky moments where it puts a heightened emphasis on making Solange an avatar for the suffocating influence of White Chrisitan Nationalism on the world, The Eggers Brothers fare pretty well with the choices they make here. The challenging mix of building an atmosphere that gradually shifts as one person's response to the other's mind games goes from civil to hostile and playing into the absurdity of this scenario with moments of goofy, gross-out humor is handled smoothly, the cartoonishly diabolical Hunter and the empathetic/volcanic Norwood make for great sparring partners-particularly when the film evolves into its weirdest, nuttiest form in the final 30 minutes and there are some really cool stylistic flourishes (the montage!) scattered throughout this thing that show that these guys have some real juice as filmmakers. The Front Room is a breezy, low stakes ride even with the clear first films warts that are all over it and I'm interested to see how their craft evolves from here.        

Grade: B-