Review of Tully (spoiler alert - plot twist revealed, sorry)

Another Hollywood film, billed as a 'comedy-drama' but with no actual laughs - look at that poster and tell me this is supposed to be a comedy. Marlo (Charlize Theron) is an affluent mum with two 'challenging' children and an unplanned third one on the way, when her even-more-affluent brother suggests that she and her husband get a 'night nanny' At first Marlo refuses to share the intimate parts of her life with a stranger but after the baby is born, and she's overwhelmed with the workload and the stress, and then the night-nanny arrives. She's beautiful, and cool, and she solves all of Marlo's problems - she cleans the house at night while Marlo sleeps, she bakes muffins for the children, she discusses Marlo's career frustrations and disappointments in life, and so on.

Then she helps Marlo to re-engage with her husband sexually, and then the two women go out on the town, get drunk and have a car accident that almost kills Marlo - and while she is recovering in hospital we realise that the night-nanny is actually a product of Marlo's imagination. She's been solving her problems herself, via her imaginary helper, but doing so in a way that is frankly psychotic. No-one else seems to have noticed.

So it's interesting, and has led to some thoughtful reflections about post-partum psychosis, but ultimately unsatisfactory as a film. It just doesn't seem fair to have been so misled without any hint that this is a psychological film, not a buddy movie - though in fairness, the sex scene with night-nanny in a diner waitress uniform ought to have been a clue.

Watched on Netflix via smartphone and Chromecast.