The first hint of Alice Lowe‘s knack for weaving darkly comic material that walks a high wire came with her co-writing stint on Ben Wheatley‘s “Sightseers.” And fans of that film will want to keep “Prevenge” on their radar, as Lowe’s directorial debut — which she also wrote and stars in — turns up the dial a little more with a pregnancy horror comedy that takes a deadly look at prepartum depression.
The story tells the tale of Ruth, who believes her baby is ordering her to kill people. And so she does, and the result is a movie that acts as a bit of warning to “watch out for nature“:
A pitch black, wryly British comedy from the mind of Alice Lowe, Prevenge follows Ruth, a pregnant woman on a killing spree. It’s her misanthropic unborn baby dictating Ruth’s actions, holding society responsible for the absence of a father. The child speaks to Ruth from the womb, coaching her to lure and ultimately kill her unsuspecting victims.
Struggling with her conscience, loneliness, and a strange strain of prepartum madness, Ruth must ultimately choose between redemption and destruction at the moment of motherhood.
Having shown at Venice, Toronto and most recently the London International Film Festival, Prevenge marks the directorial debut from Lowe, who is a true triple threat, writing, directing, and acting in the film during her own real-life pregnancy.
“Prevenge” opens on February 10, 2017 in the U.K. — there’s no U.S. distribution for the picture yet.