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The first iteration of Emma Seligman’s “Shiva Baby” was a short fiction film she produced for her thesis at NYU in 2018. In that short, college student Danielle runs into her on-the-side sugar daddy at a family shiva where the two confront the secrets they’ve been keeping from each other. Since then, Seligman has elevated her work from an interesting idea to a fully-fledged masterpiece. The plot of 2020’s feature-length “Shiva Baby” remains largely the same, but with much more room to explore the complex power dynamics at play in this large Jewish family and build waves of slowly rising tension.
Seligman imbues almost every second of the film with overwhelming anxiety. Each line of dialogue spins a new thread of a complex web for viewers to revel in, or attempt to untangle if they dare. Danielle’s sugar baby status is further complicated by the presence of Maya, one of her past romantic partners, a relationship all of her older relatives dismiss under the guise of the girls just “experimenting.” Seligman is herself bisexual, and the whole story has an ethereally queer quality. The scenario of a sugar daddy at a funeral has a very bleak but hysterically funny awkwardness to it, evoking the 2016 dark comedy “Suicide Kale” (also by a queer director, Carly Usdin) about a dinner party that goes awry when a guest finds an unsigned suicide note. It’s often difficult for films to walk the line between funny and horrifying, but “Shiva Baby” does backflips on it without faltering for a minute.
Seligman also uses her own background as a young Jewish woman to inform the story and characters. Her characters play their formal roles as mourners, while chafing against the unspoken rules of these types of family gatherings. The Jewishness of the family is an integral part of the story, and is woven artfully throughout the film.
Seligman’s sense for suspenseful direction is impeccable, and her sophomore feature could just as easily be a horror movie as a follow-up comedy; she could bring new depth to either genre. This perfect balance between horror and comedy is only intensified by the score. Composer Ariel Marx artfully includes the chaotic noises of the shiva, making for particularly grounding and grating moments in the music. The use of intense “Jaws”-like string instruments puts viewers on edge, and clever sound mixing of a crying baby helps emphasize the film’s most harrowing moments.
These types of sound interpolations help to bridge the gap between viewers and Danielle. The audience reacts to the shrill score at the same moment Danielle is dealing with the baby’s shrill crying after an increasingly tense day. Rachel Sennott reprises her role as the central character from the short film, acing the role of an imperfect, aimless almost-college graduate. Repeatedly, she butts heads with her old friend/flame Maya, played by Molly Gordon of “Booksmart” fame. Gordon’s performance is exceptionally impressive here as she brings an incredible depth and life to the character, and her chemistry with Sennott is exquisite.
Overall, “Shiva Baby” shows a bright future for new, queer stories in filmmaking. It’s an expertly directed portrait of an extended family and all the complexities, questions, and deceptions that come with it. It’s one of those rare films where every person on set — from the director, to the composer, to the cinematographer, to the costumer, to the actors — perfectly understood the assignment. The pieces of the film fit together like a well-oiled machine to masterfully portray a messy, nuanced family.
