A Bump Along the Way (Shelly Love, 2019): UK

Review by Christiana Leonardo. Viewed at the Santa Barbara International Film Festival 2020.

Seated for the first time in the grand Arlington Theatre for the opening night film of the Santa Barbara International Film Festival I was hopeful to start this ten day festival off with a bang. Marketed as  female led feature filmed in Ireland, A Bump Along the Way was a bland comedy that did not exactly wow me.

A 44 year old single mother, Pamela (Bronaugh Gallagher), works at a bakery, struggling to provide for herself and her teen daughter when she, wait for it, unexpectedly finds a bun in her own oven. Her daughter, Allegra (Lola Petticrew), is a condescending sixteen year old who is disappointed in her mothers choices and is mortified that her mother has been impregnated after a one-night-stand. The two have a classic hot and cold relationship. Family dynamics fluctuate during the pregnancy and leads us all the way up to the birth.

The scene where Pamela breaks the news about her pregnancy and, as a peace offering, makes quinoa for her vegan daughter. Unsure of how to scoop it up and eat it, the quinoa crumbles on her spoon, symbolic of her failed attempts to do better as a mother. Allegra responds to the news by storming out and ungratefully telling Pamela she is a disappointment of a mother.

Convincing performances by the two female leads left me feeling bad it was wasted on a flat storyline.

The sound of the film was really nice and kept the film from moving too slow, the sounds of the environment carried the flow of transitions, the scribbling of a pencil, the drip of a faucet, even the soft touch of a hand to the table.

This movie is not one for the books and did not hold much significance for me for the experience of older pregnant women, mother daughter relationships or female lead films.