WHY… CAN’T … I … DIE?
Main Cast: Brandy Norwood, Kathryn Hunter
Directors: Max and Sam Eggers
2024’s THE FRONT ROOM is the kind of story that gives me anxiety. Pretty much ANY story where the main character is being manipulated and undermined by a devious personality with no conscience or remorse, whose only desire is to do evil, and let someone else take the blame gives me anxiety.
Okay, that’s not REALLY what’s going on here, but close enough.
Written and directed by Sam and Max Eggers (from a short story by Susan Hill), THE FRONT ROOM focuses on Belinda (Brandy Norwood) and Norman (Andrew Burnap, SNOW WHITE), a couple about to welcome a baby daughter. Norman is a lawyer while Belinda is—was—a professor. She quits her job early on, and just when things are looking grim for the couple, Norman gets word his father is about to die.
Cue Solange, the stepmother (Kathryn Hunter). Norman hasn’t talked much about his family with his wife, for a very good reason. His stepmother was an overly religious, abusive woman who wouldn’t let him eat until she believed him when he sang Jesus Loves Me. Norman’s an adult now, though, and chooses not to interact with the woman who terrorized his childhood.
Until his father dies and Solange chooses to give all of her late husband’s money, including the money from the sale of her house, to her stepson and his wife. Norman and Belinda could really use the money. There’s a catch. Solange is OLD and her doctors don’t think it’s a good idea she live alone.
Belinda has had no prior experience with the woman and doesn’t know what she’s getting into, so she convinces Norman to let Solange move in with them.
The manipulation begins immediately as Solange claims the baby’s nursery as her room, forcing them to put their new baby in the room of the dead son. Then she convinces them the name they’ve chosen for the baby isn’t good enough, and instead offers another option, which the couple agree to use.
But then things get worse. When Belinda breaks a promise not to tell Norman that his step-mother is incontinent, Solange makes her sorry for ever bringing it up. And as Norman carries his messy stepmother to the bathroom, Solange stops crying just long enough to give Belinda—whom she constantly refers to as Belinder—a little smile over Norman’s shoulder.
Now Belinda understands just who she’s invited her into home. Well, Solange’s home after she decides to pay off their mortgage for them.
THE FRONT ROOM is a movie I saw a trailer for and thought that looked pretty intense and interesting, and then I never saw at the theater. I stand by that decision, there’s nothing here that needs to be experienced in the theater, your TV at home will work just fine.
It’s pretty much a run of the mill movie of this genre, of higher quality than a Lifetime Original movie, but still very much in that vein. It was marketed as a horror movie, and I suppose to an extent that’s pretty close, but for the most part, this is a straight thriller, and the twists and turns lead exactly where you think they will.
Brandy gives a great performance. I’ve never seen her act except in the few bits of I STILL KNOW WHAT YOU DID LAST SUMMER I’ve seen over the years, never watched a single episode of Moesha, but she definitely knows what she’s doing. Andrew Burnap’s Norman was pretty bland and kept making me think he was being played by Hugh Dancy, which I would have loved (huge Hannibal fan). But Kathryn Hunter is obviously the star of this movie.
Looking at her other credits, I’ve seen her in lots of things and she always seems to melt into her roles, whether as the madam in POOR THINGS or the overbearing mother in Andor … okay, maybe she has a type. Either way, she’s excellent here and it was fun to watch her and Brandy do battle for Norman, the baby, and the house.
Sam and Max Eggers, brothers of Robert Egger, have worked with their brother on bigger movies (Max wrote THE LIGHTHOUSE while Sam was a PA on THE WITCH), and now they’re making their own movies. THE FRONT ROOM isn’t quite as deliberate or thoughtful as any of Robert’s movies, but it’s very watchable and I dug it.
C. Dennis Moore is the author of over 60 published short stories and novellas in the speculative fiction genre. Most recent appearances are in the Dark Highlands 2, What Fears Become, Dead Bait 3 and Dark Highways anthologies. His novels are Revelations, and the Angel Hill stories, The Man in the Window, The Third Floor, and The Flip.
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