‘Saint Frances': SXSW Winner Is a Mixed Bag of Millennial Angst [Review]

Alex Thompson’s feature-length debut “Saint Frances” is a derivative movie that wound up losing me fairly early into its runtime. O'Sullivan, also making her feature-length debut (as a writer) means well with her screenplay, however, it tries too hard to checkmark every social issue it can cram into its 90-minute runtime. It’s as preachy as a daily scroll through a Social Justice Warrior’s daily Twitter feed, but the result is barely adequate, a bizarrely ineffective and uneven movie. Regardless, critics have been suckered into embracing this weirdly put-together SXSW dramedy, as we can attest by its impressive 98% fresh rating on Rotten Tomatoes and 83 score on Metacritic.

“Saint Frances" is the story of Northwestern dropout Bridget (Kelly O'Sullivan), a 34-year-old Chicago waitress (she actually prefers to be called a “server”) who hits a snag in life and goes through a millennial identity crisis. When we are first introduced to Bridget she ends up hooking up with 26-year-old Jace (Max Lipchitz) at a party. Next thing you know, they are living together. But deep beneath Bridget is a sense of isolation and an urge to break free and to find herself. She desperately wants to do something with her life and decides that quitting her waitressing job in the middle of a shift and taking on a full-time nanny gig will do the trick. Taking care of 6-year-old Frances (Ramona Edith-Williams), a wild child with a brash mouth, starts off wily out of hand, Frances (who likes to be called Franny) is more than a handful, she’s a monster. But, of course, these two start to get used to each other and the unequivocal embrace of friendship is just what they need, especially Bridget who ends up learning valuable life lessons by taking care of this child.

As if more plot couldn’t have been piled onto this already slight movie, Bridget discovers that she is pregnant, this leads to her getting an abortion and then, misguidingly, hooking up with Frances’ daycare guitar teacher. Don’t get me started on Frances's lesbian parents, Maya and Annie (Charin Alvarez and Lily Mojekwu), proud progressives who hang up signs in their front yard saying, “Black Lives Matter” and “Hate Has No Home Here,” (could the message be aid on any thicker). Maya resents the work-related parenting absence of lawyer and breadwinner Annie, somehow, Frances gets involved in the middle of this dispute because, well, O’Sullivan couldn’t be less subtle with just about everything she writes in this movie.

There are times when “Saint Frances” plays like a straight comedy and other times as a dead-serious social drama. "I'm not an impressive person", utters Bridget at one point during the film, but Thompson and O’Sullivan never fully tackle that feeling, opting instead for layered overplotting as the subplots pile up. Bridget has a lot of deeply personal issues, but O’Sullivan’s screenplay makes the mistake of focusing too much on story and not enough on character. The lack of nuance given to Bridget by the filmmakers makes her come off as a self-absorbed narcissist rather than a genuinely confused person. [C]