Adalynn

I figured the outcome of this not even remotely original movie very early on. Let just say that boxes that came in the mail (or I guess from Amazon since it's this time and age) were a give away. I guess they figured, "who the heck will remember the first one, probably those people are all dead by now." Well considering that one of my doctorates was in psychology, I did remember. I was surprised that the husband was actually the husband, since this one did say he was the husband. I guess that made it an original. LOL This subject has been used multiple times in movies. If you are younger than me by a lot you may like it.

What I sat down to watch the 2023 movie "Adalynn", I had never actually heard about it. But the movie seemed like it would be worthwhile watching, given all the award emblems on the front of the movie's cover. And with the movie's synopsis also being somewhat interesting, of course I opted to sit down and watch what writer Jerrod D. Brito and director Jacob Byrd had to offer.

I figured that I was in for a horror movie here, but "Adalynn" was more of a psychological thriller than it was a horror movie. So that was a little bit disappointing. Not that the movie wasn't watchable or enjoyable, because it was. I just had expected a bit more scary contents.

Writer Jerrod D. Brito put together a fair enough script and storyline for director Jacob Byrd to bring to the screen. There was a good narrative progress throughout the 88 minutes that the movie ran for. And director Jacob Byrd was definitely good at slowly building up the tension and the narrative.

Needless to say that I wasn't familiar with the cast ensemble in "Adalynn", but it should be noted that they had a good ensemble of actors and actresses. Especially leading actress Sydney Carvill really carried the movie quite nicely with her performance with the distraught and challenged Adalynn character.

Visually then "Adalynn" was okay. It is not a movie that make use of a whole lot of special effects or CGI. And that sort of makes it a minimalistic movie, in a sense. But it works, because director Jacob Byrd didn't need to deliver a barrage of special effects to win over the audience with the narrative in the movie.

This movie is worth sitting down watching, if you enjoy a psychological thriller that sort of takes you on a chaotic ride through a woman's degrading mental health and spiraling descent into madness and frustration.

However, "Adalynn" is hardly a movie that warrants more than just a single viewing, as there isn't really sufficient contents and meat on the bone that is the storyline for more than a single viewing.

My rating of "Adalynn" lands on a six out of ten stars.

What did I just watch?!

Obviously, it's a psychological exploration of post-partum depression.

But I wouldn't classify it as either a horror or thriller...rather, just a drama.

Calling it a slow burner is an understatement.

Because literally nothing happens in this film.

It's just a low budget film that attempts to portray the psychological downfall of a woman who miscarries.

With bad voiceovers that are meant to be auditory hallucinations.

And some very mediocre acting.

Seriousness of the topic, aside.

This film is just way too slow and boring- even during it's "climax" (which is rather anti-climactic, to say the least).

I mean...the whole thing is based on character development.

But I never found myself actually caring about the main character.

Making it really hard to remain engaged with.

Perhaps it's because I'm not the target market for this kind of story...but I just found this to be a completely forgettable film.

Clock does a much better job of attacking the subject, than this film manages to do, in my opinion.

So maybe watch that instead.

2 out of 10.

This movie deals with mental health issues and uncomfortable parental tragedies that could be triggering for some viewers. Otherwise, "Adalynn" is a layered descent into madness that aims to put the viewer in the title character's shoes. Some may be put off by this, but the director really captures and illustrates the frustration and confusion Adalynn faces throughout the film.

At times, it's uncomfortable. Other times, it can be heartbreaking. Some parts may intentionally squeeze a chuckle out of you. But if there's a takeaway from this film, it's that it really calls out the real-life taboos about postpartum struggles mothers often feel like they need to keep secret.

This underrated thriller may divide audiences, but it's worth a watch nonetheless.

Horror is an excellent way of exploring things like mental health (Saint Maud), Grief (the babbadook) and in this case post-partum depression. It is something people don't talk about much, and was a great candidate for a film.

Unfortunately it didn't work. At all. The lead actress tried but the script was incredibly clunky and contained some of the worst dialog I have listened too in a long time. It was very stilted, very un-natural, and required the actors to over-act to compensate. Filled with cliches, and the entire thing felt mechanical, like the writer had tried to study humans from a distance through bad TV but had never actually had a relationship with one. You could basically see the calculations he/she had made about each line. The exposition was sloppy, and we constantly learn about the inner mental state of the character because she verbally tells us (through the gimmick of writing in a journal), which is a cop out to give information we should have been able to glean from the acting and visuals (but couldn't because there wasn't space for that).

I don't understand on any level why the writer decided to make the husband a paediatrician, it serves to make every subsequent decision make zero sense at all. He is a qualified medical doctor who knows that his wife has a serious pre-existing mental health condition, is off her medication, the danger that poses, and also knows full well the additional mental health risk from postpartum depression. A conference of other paediatricians is basically the most forgiving event you can imagine in terms of understanding why he would need to bow out. He was also stupid to commit to it, even if the baby arrived slightly earlier than expected. His reaction to her phone call admitting problems was just ridiculous

She then receives medical advice from her doctor, in a conversation where she admits having serious trouble and absolutely 100% shows diagnosable signs of postpartum depression, and despite knowing that she is alone and has a history of mental health problems he does nothing. This again makes even less sense when you think about the fact that the husband is a doctor, it is highly unlikely that he doesn't know her doctor at least professionally because he would have recommended him). On top of that again the dialogue just isn't like any medical conversation anyone has ever had with their doctor, the tone was wrong, the logic of the conversation was wrong, everything about it was wrong.

Even the baby was terrible, there are scenes where the baby is crying and coughing after feeding and you can see very very clearly that it is completely inanimate plastic baby, not even being moved by the actor. They choose silly camera angles to try and disguise it (but then cut to angles that make it obvious thus defeating the point).

The score was also amateurish, the logic seemed to be "something significant has happened, so let's accent it with a loud noise!". The highly discordant noises came in far too early and there is no particular build up in intensity, which there absolutely needed to be.

It was a terrible shame to lump the actors with this film. The script should never ever have been selected for production.

Lots of the other reviews here are from people saying it is too slow, or not "horror" enough. Personally I enjoy both jump scare and gory horror as well as interesting psychological horror, the pacing did not bother me at all. It just isn't a good psychological horror, or drama ,or anything else. Do not allow whomever wrote this script to waste your evening.