Baby Money screens as part of the 2021 Fantasia International Film Festival. For ticket and further into check out the Fantasia website.
Synopsis
Minny is pregnant. Great news, right? Not exactly. This was unexpected and not exactly welcome, but she and her boyfriend, Gil, love each other and are sticking with it. But babies are expensive and neither’s prospects are the best, so a quick break-in with Tony (Travis Hammer) and Dom, and they’re in for some quick money to help start a new life together. The job goes real south real fast, however, and Dom and Gil are on the run real quick. They find themselves hiding out in the home of Heidi (Taja V. Simpson), a nurse who treated Minny and her cerebral palsy-afflicted son, Chris (Vernon Taylor III, who has palsy in real life). Now they’re all in a hostage situation with a hot property they need to sell off fast so they can try to make it the hell out of there before the cops find them. It’s not how anyone wanted this to go, but this is what you have to do to make Baby Money these days.
Review
Baby Money, my first foray in to Fantasia Festival 2021, is very much a game of two halves. The debut feature from writer/directors Luc Walpoth and Mikhael Bassilli, co-written by MJ Palo, attempts to tell a female empowerment story wrapped in a home invasion. Its opening scenes easily telling a story which could have been their own movie. Whilst its latter stages lose sight of the earlier comedy in order to become something more affecting.
At the centre of the story is Minny (Danay Garcia), pregnant by her lowlife boyfriend Gil (Michael Drayer) and assisting him and his even more lowlife friends with a break-in. Minny has the best of intentions, she just wants a good life for her child. Gil, on the other hand, is easily led and thinks the road to a better life is through crime.
Things quickly go awry in ways no audience member could have predicted. When Gil and his unhinged partner Dom (Joey Kern) break in to an elderly couples home things do not go as planned. The scenario ends with the home owners dead, Dom suffering non-life threatening wounds and Minny driving off with the getaway car.
For a while the narrative sidelines Minny. Shifting her to the periphery allows Baby Money to explore the comedy in Gil and Dom’s awful attempt at a robbery. But it also opens the narrative door to some unexpected storytelling. The pair of hapless crooks break in to a nearby house and find themselves confronted by its owner Heidi (Taja V. Simpson). Heidi just happens to be the nurse who scanned Minny earlier in the day, conveniently tying together the narrative arc.
Heidi lives with her disabled son Chris (Vernon Taylor III). Gil and Dom quickly learn to navigate Chris’ cerebral palsy and their injuries but they need a plan to escape. That plan requires Minny to get the getaway car back to them so they can use a phone to call the shady figure pulling the strings on their robbery.
Confused yet? The narrative is somewhat convoluted. But the execution puts all the disparate elements together in a satisfying and engaging manner. See Baby Money isn’t really telling us a story simply about a break in gone wrong.
It’s really about character.
The story isn’t perfect. There’s little time spent setting up Minny and Gil’s relationship. We’re asked to follow them on this desperate journey. But there’s little desperation to show how they came to reach this point. However, Garcia’s performance as Minny is spot on. She brings conviction to every scene and ensures the audience never questions her motivations. It pays off well in the closing moments of the film.
Baby Money isn’t perfect. Its narrative meanders through act two but is boosted by Garcia’s performance. The biggest takeaway will be its final message which lands strongly and securely.
Verdict
Baby Money is a skilled debut feature from Mikhael Bassilli and Luc Walpoth. It’s underlying message of female empowerment is marvellously enhanced by comedically foolish men.
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