Review: Unpregnant

Unpregnant (2020) is a comedy/bromance written by Rachel Lee Goldenberg, Bill Parker, Jenni Hendriks, Jennifer Kaytin Robinson, and Ted Caplan. It is based on a novel, also by Hendriks and Caplan, and was directed by Rachel Lee Goldenberg.

As the film begins,we are introduced to Veronica (Haley Lu Richardson), an intelligent, popular 17 year old high school student, as she sits in a high school bathroom stall taking a piss. Now, I know what you’re thinking, but trust me, this isn’t piss porn. Veronica’s pissing occurs to fulfill a utilitarian purpose. I mean, in addition to its purgative one. She is in fact, taking an at-home pregnancy test.

It’s positive. She’s preggers.

Utterly flummoxed by the dilemma she finds herself in, Veronica inadvertently drops the test on the bathroom floor causing it to slide out of the stall. At that moment, someone walks in and picks up the test. It’s Bailey (Barbie Ferreira), an old bestie of Veronica’s. The two engage in a little awkward chat regarding Veronica’s situation. Suddenly, the two are interrupted by a fellow student, seeking feedback on the school yearbook. Bailey pockets the test and splits, leaving Veronica to deal with the yearbook guardian single-handedly.

Veronica calls a local family planning clinic to obtain information about terminating her pregnancy. She is afraid to tell her parents for they are devout Catholics, and thus could never remain impartial. She discovers, much to her dismay, that in order to have the procedure done without parental consent, she will need to leave her home state of Illinois, and travel to a clinic that is in Albuquerque, New Mexico. She takes inventory of her resources and starts making a plan.

Meanwhile, someone at school has discovered the pregnancy test that Bailey tossed into a dumpster at school. Now Veronica’s peer group, a contingent of popular, socially connected girls are hot to get to the bottom of the mystery. Whose pregnancy test is it? While unsure at the moment, they are determined to find the answer.

Following an unsuccessful meeting with her boyfriend who is also the father, Veronica does some soul searching. Realizing that she can’t do this on her own, she turns to Bailey. Despite the fact that their relationship has been dormant for some time, Bailey agrees, and the two of them hop into Bailey’s car, and hit the road for Albuquerque.

If you made it this far into this review, then you needn’t suffer any longer because I loved this movie! Feel free to stick around while I elaborate on some of the things I particularly enjoyed if you want, but if all you needed to know was whether or not you should watch it, the answer is an enthusiastic yes.

To be sure, a few of the plot devices area little trope-y at this point, and the film does fit quite nicely into a pre-established niche. Certainly I’m overstating the obvious by suggesting that this film is reminiscent of stuff like Superbad (Greg Mottola, 2007), Booksmart (Olivia Wilde, 2019), Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle (Danny Leiner, 2004), Road Trip (Todd Phillips, 2000), and Fanboys (Kyle Newman, 2009) to name a few. For my money, I liked Unpregnant better than all of them.

Let’s start with the two leads. Haley Lu Richardson and Barbie Ferreira are fantastic. I don’t mean to contrast this film with Booksmart to an unnecessary degree. However, the comparisons seem apt, as the two films, while trying to achieve two different conclusions, share many similarities along the way. I should say right off the bat that I liked Booksmart. I liked it a lot. There was some stuff I didn’t love, but overall I found the film to be successful at what it was trying to do. Kaitlyn Dever and Beanie Feldstein were both awesome in that film. So I mean no disrespect to either of them when I assert that Richardson and Ferreira are both funnier and more likable. There is something more real about Veronica and Bailey, and I felt more empathy for them. They were a joy to take this road trip with, and the film has so much heart because both of these ladies played the shit out of their parts.

The writing is sharp, and clever. Gags that are setup early on in the film pay off later on, and not usually in ways you would have predicted or expected. There are a couple of small things that might test one’s suspension of disbelief for a second, but the film moves along briskly enough, and is so engaging that you won’t be held up by those things for long. Everything makes sense, and despite the fact that, as a comedy, things must be exaggerated for laughs, almost every encounter our intrepid heroes find themselves in is 100% believable. The characters have poignant, well-developed arcs that manage to mine emotion out of the viewer without being maudlin or melodramatic.

This film is very funny. I’m a hard man to make laugh a lot of the time. I blame this on my twisted and bizarre sense of humor. I’m an idiot and a complete pain in the ass. But I found myself laughing consistently throughout the film. In a way this film reminded me of Little Miss Sunshine (Jonathan Dayton, Valerie Faris, 2006), another comedy I found myself pleasantly surprised by. One of the things I loved about the movie is the way jokes would start small, find a way to grow as the film progresses (and organically I might add) and end up paying off in a big way that got big laughs. Not enough films do this. Unpregnant did this very well. A decent quantity of the jokes, got huge laughs from me.

I suppose at some point we need to deal with the ugly, unfortunate part of this film, which is the divisiveness that the central plot is certain to engender. Abortion is a hot button issue in this country to be sure. There are passionate feelings on either side of the debate. I don’t want to get too much into my own personal ideology. I couldn’t explain it in a non-clumsy way, I’m not going to change your mind, and you aren’t looking to have your mind changed. But what baffles me about political discourse these days, is that there is so much misrepresentation of issues and people. I’ve never been able to figure out why people need to lie, mischaracterize, and misrepresent the arguments of the people that they are in opposition to. For if you have to believe something that isn’t true to maintain your ideological view, why the fuck are you worried about maintaining it in the first place? Like, at least be real about it. If you truly disagree with someone’s position, then you should be able to debate them without mendacity, right? If not, why are you even debating them?

Unpregnant handles its subject matter with the velveteen touch of a dandy fop. Certainly as women’s reproductive rights are a politically charged issue, there is a certain amount of potential controversy inherent in the film. The filmmakers leave no ambiguity as to which side of the debate they fall on. However, they never beat you over the head with it. The film is never preachy, nor is it condescending. Even though this film is a comedy, they deal with the “A” word in a very sensitive and serious manner. In fact, in what ended up being one of the most personally stupefying moments in the film for me, there is a point at which this film could be viewed as a modern reboot of the docu-shock shitpacker Teenage Mother (Jerry Gross, 1967). Teenage Mother is a truly singular film, and that Unpregnant, whether intentionally or not, called back to Teenage Mother, gives it an exorbitant amount of street cred.

But the thing about that part that I found particularly praiseworthy, was how thorough and real the information provided during the climactic scene was. I can’t tell you how many times during my college career, I was accosted by gruesome pro-life demonstrations on campus. I always found these displays to be repugnant and irresponsible. Not because I was shown horrific images without my consent, but because the process, the medical process of abortion was utterly misrepresented in these installations. So much dangerously inaccurate information. It shouldn’t matter what side of the debate you are on, nobody should think that the dissemination of inaccurate medical advice is a good way to achieve anything.

So when Unpregnant takes the time to stop, and take you through things as Veronica is going through them, I was both surprised and impressed. At first, I sort of hit a hurdle where I started to be concerned. I thought for a moment, is the film becoming too political at this point? Is it pushing too hard now, ideologically speaking now? Because that’s a fine line to tread. You want your film to say something, to make a point, to take a stand. But the harder you push, the more likely you are to lose your audience. Some tread that line well. Some hit the gas and blow through it with gusto. Some stay as far the fuck away from that line as they can. Was Unpregnant going too far?

It was then that I came to the conclusion that by its very nature, this film can’t possibly avoid controversy, or the possibility that it could push too hard and too far for some people. What else can you do other than lean into it? And then I was proud of the film, and the people who paid for it for having the confidence to let the people they paid, tell the story they are there to tell.

The best part is, Unpregnant manages to not be “woke AF” while still being a smart, progressive take on a taboo subject. That was one of my complaints about Booksmart. It felt over-woke, if that makes any sense. Like, it seemed almost confrontational in its portrayal of would-be modern high school students. Like it wanted to sort the audience out into who is cool enough and who isn’t by their reaction to things like boys and girls shitting with each other in the room. Unpregnant on the other hand manages to portray a very up-to-date student body, but without the unnecessary theatrics.

It’s very easy for someone to look at someone else and make a judgment about them based on some circumstance that is visible from the outside. But nobody really knows what it’s like to be anybody other than themselves. So even though I may look at someone, and make a judgment about them. I always try and remember that I have no idea what situation led them to wherever it is that they are. That until I walk a mile in their shoes, I can’t say whether whatever choices they are making for themselves are wrong or right. I can only make that decision for myself. People spend too much time talking, and not enough time listening. I’m not saying Unpregnant could change the world. But if people can approach it with an open mind, it could be a spark that ignites a conversation between people.

Had enough? Ready for me to shut up? Here it comes.

Unpregnant is the best film I have seen yet during my time here at Review Nation. It is funny, upbeat, heartfelt, thoughtful, and a joy to watch. It’s a little dirty, but not so dirty that you couldn’t watch it with someone young. It’ll make ya laugh and it’ll make ya cry. It’ll make you think, and it’ll take your mind off the bullshit for 103 minutes.

I do not put Unpregnant on the same shelf as I do films like 2001: A Space Odyssey (Stanley Kubrick, 1968), or Seven Samurai (Akira Kurosawa, 1954). how could I? This isn’t that kind of film. It isn’t artsy or ambitious like those. It is, nonetheless, a great movie, with quality artistry behind it. It’s ambitious for what it is: a teen sex comedy, a coming of age comedy, a road picture, a bromance. It is a film that succeeds at everything it is trying to do. A feat that is rare when a film has as many writers as this one does. Seeing that during the opening credits was a real “oh shit” moment. That went from “oh shit,” to “oh yes” real quick. Unpregnant was rad.

https://youtu.be/WDulv-J1bEs

P.S. I realize the preceding review is fairly glowing. I would like to note that I watched Unpregnant after just having watched Up On The Glass (Kevin Del Principie, 2020). It’s possible my ecstatic raving has been influenced by how bad Up On the Glass was. It felt so good to watch a well-crafted film after suffering through the biggest mistake of 2020 that didn’t have anything to do with Corona 19. Like a junkie’s first high after falling off the wagon, y’know? Joy and pain, sunshine and rain.