Home Movies

Obvious Child Gets Its First Trailer

Having travelled the festival circuit, steadily gathering critical and popular acclaim along the way, we now get see what all that positive word-of-mouth is about, as Obvious Child gets its first trailer. Here's the thing - what seems obvious at first, isn't really obvious at all.

Recommended Videos

Having travelled the festival circuit, steadily gathering critical and popular acclaim along the way, we now get see what all that positive word-of-mouth is about, as Obvious Child gets its first trailer.

The feature-length directorial debut of Gillian Robespierre – from a story and script she wrote with Karen Maine, Elisabeth Holm and Anna Bean – Obvious Child is based on their 2009 short film of the same name, and stars Saturday Night Live alum Jenny Slate as Donna – an aspiring comedian who finds herself in the throes of an emotional and financial crisis, compounded by an unplanned pregnancy. What do all the people listed here have in common? That’s right – they’re all women.

Though the trailer predictably packages this film as a romantic comedy – following scenes of angst with the inevitable and usual montage of a distressed woman being cheered by best friends, finding new love and randomly dancing – it then becomes something else. Make no mistake – this is not a typical romantic comedy. This is a romantic comedy written, directed and largely performed by women and, as such, presents what appears to be a much more subversive take on the cookie-cutter coming-of-age story that is often thrust upon female characters and audiences alike. Here we have a female comedian dealing with difficult subjects, such as betrayal, unemployment, religion and abortion, in the only way she really knows how – by finding the humour in it. The result looks to be something much closer to reality than most other ‘romantic comedy’ projects manage to achieve.

With Jake Lacy (The Office), Gaby Hoffmann (Girls), David Cross (Arrested Development) and Richard Kind (Argo) in supporting roles, this film has clearly attracted talented and sought after names to what is a directorial debut – which is surely more evidence of a strong and interesting script. Such a story hangs mainly on the shoulders of the central role, however, and judging by the trailer, Jenny Slate seems to tune her performance perfectly – making Donna neither whiney, nor fragile in the face of adversity, which is often the result when female characters are handled by male filmmakers.

Obvious Child certainly looks like a movie worth seeking out when it is released in the US on June 6 2014. It will also screen in the Sundance London Film Festival on April 25th, 2014.