Ellen Page is excellent as a homeless young woman, cynical, hard-bitten and foul-mouthed, who abducts a toddler from its rich, neglectful mother and makes friends with her ex-boyfriend's estranged mother--under the guise that she's a single mom raising this woman's granddaughter all on her own. A hard movie to like, but also a movie impossible to dismiss, "Tallulah" is an impressive production purchased by Netflix that has many things to recommend it, not the least of which is an array of fabulous performances from the ladies in the cast. Unfortunately, filmmaker Sian Heder is a much better director than she is a writer, and the relationship between Tallulah and her boyfriend--a crucial element in the story--is not convincing (the problem is with his character, who simply does not ring true). Page is reunited with her "Juno" co-star Allison Janney, and the two have a special rapport that is, by turns, angry and bitter and lovely and moving. However, the arc of Janney's character isn't as profound as its meant to be (for instance, she's terrible and nasty to her soon-to-be-ex husband, who left her for another man), and the last portion of the plot is gummy and indecisive.
Review of Tallulah
