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In Marielle Heller’s Nightbitch, an adaptation of Rachel Yoder’s bestselling novel of the same name, Amy Adams’ character is known only as “Mother.” An artist who gave it all up to become a stay-at-home mom to a precocious little boy while her husband (Scoot McNairy) is gone for days at a time on business trips. Trapped in a proverbial Groundhog’s Day time vortex of safe foods, unexplained stickiness, and high-pitched tantrums against bedtime, Mother is unfulfilled, immeasurably frustrated, and completely exhausted.
From the very start, Nightbitch wants us to know that Mother is in control of the story, allowing us to hear – and often witness – every intrusive thought plaguing her every waking moment. What if we could just slap someone across the face after they tell us “happiness is a choice” as we’re drowning in stress? Wouldn’t it feel good to unload the truth of our misery onto someone when they ask, “How are you?” instead of repeating one of the five socially acceptable small-talk refrains programmed into us like a draw-string doll? What’s keeping us from giving ourselves over to our primal, animalistic instincts?
Oh, yeah, that’s right. The kid needs us to fry up a hashbrown puck because it’s the only thing he’ll eat this week.
The opening scenes of Nightbitch double as a PSA for not having children but sprinkle in just enough cuteness from Mother’s Son (Arleigh and Emmett Snowden) to remind us why we humans feel so compelled to keep having more of these little hellions despite knowing all of the terror they bring. But everything changes when Son notices a hairy patch on Mother’s back, pointing it out with the brutal, unfettered honesty that can only come from a child observing another person’s appearance. Mother is transforming, and it’s something far weirder than unwanted facial hair growth as a result of changing hormones.
From here, one would hope that Nightbitch goes all-in on the body horror transformation of a woman who turns into a dog at night, but it’s strangely reserved for a movie featuring such a selfless and committed performance by Adams. There are teases of potential viscera, but opts for a CGI husky instead. Nightbitch isn’t afraid to remind the viewer that motherhood* begins with an act of violence against the creator — permanently changing a person’s DNA, organ positioning, and identity — but it also feels it necessary to constantly remind the audience of that message like a pair of plastic keys clacking in the face of a crying infant in a restaurant.
Mother’s interior thoughts evolve into lecturing narration, a distraction from the sincerely breathtaking monologues Adams unleashes when she’s reached her breaking points. Whereas Barbie had a sole speech about how hard it is to be a woman, Nightbitch turned it into an entire screenplay. There’s a refreshing beauty in the frank approach the film has in discussing the hells and hardships of raising a child, one where moms admit to letting pet birds fly away and feel lied to about what becoming a parent is actually all about, especially with a script that never treats these disappointments like a moral failing.
However, it is important to note that in terms of scope, this is a look at parenting firmly through the lens of an upper-middle-class white family being presented as universal, so it may be doubly frustrating for those who come from backgrounds that didn’t allow for mommy/baby yoga classes or weekly play dates at the library with live music.
Unfortunately, Nightbitch is far more interested in barking than biting. Marielle Heller has a fantastic grasp on the darkly comedic premise of an overworked mother giving into her feral instincts when toxic positivity has poisoned her kale for the last time, but the film never fully gives itself over to its animalistic urges. The result is an Important Issues Movie with a should-be awards contender lead performance fighting against its destiny to be a schlocky B-movie.
Comparison is the thief of joy, but at least in the 2017 indie horror-comedy Bitch, also about a mother who gets fed up with her do-nothing husband and becomes a dog, writer/director Marianna Palka was willing to grab onto the absurdity with all four paws.
It’s for this reason that Heller’s latest is best served as a gateway horror comedy for the crowd who doesn’t understand that horror is the most useful genre to provide an outlet for existential rage that won’t get you a visit from child protective services but desperately needs the encouragement to tell their spouse they want a separation after being compared to their mother. (What a year for Scoot McNairy playing shitass husbands/fathers in horror, though!)
Nightbitch is the “society expects too damn much of women” horror film for folks who feel zen after watching organized refrigerator restock videos on TikTok and thought The Substance was too extreme. I try to judge movies for what they are rather than what they’re not, but I can’t help but wish we got something a little more off-leash.
*Not all who are capable of childbirth are mothers and not all mothers engage in childbirth.
