Parenthood has always been made out to be this amazing, beautiful precious life experience that only creates positive experiences for the people who choose to partake. It must be even worse for women, who have to deal with the fact that motherhood is so important Jesus’s mom is revered as much as the man himself. However, the moment I ask someone who has kids how everything is going for them, one of the first two things I hear is “Stay single and free, trust me.” Tully presents that side of parenting. Jason Reitman, Diabolo Cody, and Charlize Theron combined for the criminally underrated Young Adult a few years ago, but Tully pushes their collaboration to even greater heights, meaning that I will be eagerly awaiting the Charbolo Reitman trilogy.
Marlo (Theron) is a Mom twice, soon to be thrice, over. She lives in the suburbs with her husband Drew (Ron Livingston) who’s always at work, leaving Marlo at home with now all 3 kids. She loves them all, but between the sleepless nights and her “quirky” middle child, Marlo is at her wit’s end. Taking the advice of her brother (Mark Duplass), Marlo hires a night nanny to help her until the baby starts sleeping through the night. As soon as Tully (Mackenzie Davis) appears, Marlo’s personality starts coming back, helping her reconnect back with the world and especially the person she used to be before her family.
Tully is the best movie about motherhood I might have ever seen. For the first hour, I feel like I got some real insights into what life is really like for a normal mother. Cody writes some perceptive situations of how both difficult and rewarding parenting can be, like dropping a phone on a baby or getting irritated after hearing your child be called quirky for the 100th time. Reitman then directs Tully completely inside Marlo’s perspective, where days and nights blend together, and everything moves quickly without really changing at all. And Theron holds it all together especially while Marlo threatens to burst from the excessive and consistent pressure younger mothers must live up to. The great part about all these scenes is their grounding: outside of the cell phones, these scenes could probably happen to any mother anywhere, before the night nanny arrives. Marlo isn’t a saint, or a devil, she simply…is doing her best, and I imagine most mothers upon seeing this will see pieces of themselves inside Marlo.
I only wish the story had lived in just this world for another hour and the movie might have been perfect. However, the hook of this movie is this nanny comes in, so you have to use it right? Thankfully, Tully pivots the story from a story about motherhood to a story about women, and how their life after motherhood becomes a tug of war between their past and present. As played by Mackenzie Davis, Tully IS effervescence, and Marlo, because of her presence, starts to absorb what Tully is providing to her. Marlo’s days become more happy and chipper, with Theron using that egoless amazing performance in the first half of the movie as a nice juxtaposition to her brand new self thanks to Tully. The third act of the movie is where Tully loses its way, as if Cody, like her heroine, starts to second guess how great her story is, and decides a crazy twist will land the plane. If she had another shot, I imagine she would have replaced what she did for an additional nannyless house being run by the reenergized Marlo, completely showcasing the many facets of the life of a mother. As is, the twist does provide some obvious but nice closure to the nanny story, and ends the movie on at least a decent note.
Tully taught me a great deal about motherhood, for which I am forever grateful. Diabolo Cody and Jason Reitman bring out the best in each other, especially when their lead’s eggo is preggo. Or maybe it’s because the behind the camera duo is getting a terrific leading performance from the most versatile female actress of this generation, Charlize Theron. Don’t believe me Reese Witherspoon fans? Maybe give Fury Road another watch and get back to me…