Tag: Gail Bean


Unexpected

June 3rd, 2017 — 9:30pm

***

Unexpected-nf

This movie zeroes in on one aspect of human life that most people will eventually confront. In this case, it is the wonderful life changing experience of realizing that you (or your partner) has become pregnant.

Samantha (Cobie Smulders) is a 31-year old inner city high school teacher who has a loving, caring boyfriend (Anders Holm) who realizes that she is pregnant. Jasmine (Gail Bean) is a Black teenage girl who is one of her students who lives with her grandmother and sister in a poor neighborhood having an unstable relationship with her boyfriend but hoping to go to college next year. She also has become pregnant.

These two people bond and become very close. As we watch each of them contemplate how this seminal life event will change their lives, we are reminded how pregnancy impacts women quite differently than men and also affects single, more often minorities, and those with less financial means quite differently. Perhaps these observations should be quite obvious facts of our society, but yet our very bright young school teacher needed the nine-month gestation period to fully understand that. Similarly, this film directed by Chris Swanberg who co-wrote the screenplay with Megan Mercier allowed the viewers to fully appreciate these facts of life in about ninety minutes. (2015)

Comment » | 3 Stars, Drama

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