In Judaism, “sitting shiva” is the week-long mourning period that is observed following the passing of a first-degree relative. In Shiva Baby, a millennial undergrad feels the same sort of deep mourning, albeit over the current state of her young life. When Danielle (Rachel Sennott) returns home from NYU to attend a funeral, she knows that she’s also entering the lion’s den of an overbearing family. The equal parts eager and concerned “How are you?” triggers her anxieties of her uncertain future.

Danielle easily soothes family members expectations with talks of post-grad ambitions (either business or law school). In reality, she’s concealing the fact that she’s academically middling and currently involved with a sugar daddy in the big city. It’s not until the arrival of an unexpected guest that Danielle’s shakily constructed life starts to crack. It all sets the stage for an event where everything is set to come out.

Personal Expression

Shiva Baby is such a refreshing and enjoyable new comedy due to how totally authentic the characters and situations all feel. It’s not altogether surprising, given that the film is based on the experiences and observations from writer and director Emma Seligman’s own life, here making her directorial debut. Seligman’s shrewd observations of the Jewish culture along with a new millennial identity make for a wonderfully cringe-worthy but very real culture clash. From the specificity of detail in the shiva setting and the hilarious characters who attend it, down to its stark portrayal of young people owning their newfound sexualities, Shiva Baby is the type of equal-parts defiant and personal filmmaking that make for the best kind of directorial debuts.

Daring

While set to a fairly conventional narrative structure (that of a person returning to the home they once left and by doing so, are forced to confront their true selves), Shiva Baby merely uses this foundation to then make daring leaps from. Danielle (played note-perfect by newcomer Rachel Sennott) brings a new young woman character (made popular by Lena Dunham’s Girls and Phoebe Waller-Bridges’ Fleabag) to the big screen, who, for all of her flaws and poor decision-making, remains unapologetically herself. By her casually decided choices of engaging with a sugar daddy as well as exploration of bi-sexual attractions, Danielle subverts every expectation that both her age and gender are typically met with. In doing so, Shiva Baby shows a very real and untraditional character of female empowerment.

Craft

Shiva Baby smartly uses its single setting location to bring many elements of filmmaking together to control its tone–that being a cringe-worthy one every truth that Danielle skirts only raise the stakes to becoming a pressure cooker of discomfort (halfway through the film when she bursts out of the house to get air, we are desperately grateful for it as well).

This hilarious suffocating experience n is controlled by the entire filmmaking team: Hanna A. Park’s measured and then energetic editing controls each new wave of discomfort wonderfully. Maria Rusche’s cinematography captures the jam-packed nature of this house (building to a near-hallucinatory climax that reminded me of Rosemary’s Baby). And of singular note, composer Ariel Marx’s score is quite actually the thing that stands out that gives Shiva Baby its anxiety-inducing identity, an off-beat tension that reminded me of Jonny Greenwood’s score for Punch Drunk Love. All elements swirl to make for a cringe-worthy setting, which is pretty rad to see this all-female unit.

For our exclusive interview with Ariel Marx, click here.

Impact

Shiva Baby is sure to stay on your mind long after watching it (as it has for me). Seligman’s self-assured vision, in which all of the elements of stress and tension had me on the edge of my seat wondering how Danielle would escape the next lie, are hilariously constructed. I really can’t remember the last adult comedy that felt so edgy, raunchy, risky, yet smart. Along with the fact that this type of character, unsure how to move forward at this point in their life) is typically now only seen in TV (Fleabag, Girls), it’s refreshing to find it in a film (I hate to break it to you Judd Apatow, but The King of Staten Island didn’t feel anywhere near as enjoyable as Shiva Baby).

Conclusion

I absolutely love recommending a film like Shiva Baby, a directorial debut that is both successful in its own right and makes me look forward to what lies next for the whole filmmaking team. Especially as theaters slowly re-open and new releases continue to struggle to find mass distribution, it’s such a gift to get the chance to be able to see a new film like this one that also happens to be one of the funnier adult comedies to come out in recent times. Get behind this one, baby.

77 minutes. ‘Shiva Baby’ is not rated. Available to rent on Apple TV+ and Amazon.