Parents' Guide to Mother, Couch

Starting out as an absurd comedy and moving into a surreal nightmare, this unpleasant movie is about characters who talk a lot and listen very little, making for a confusing, frustrating experience. It's possible to make an entertaining, squirm-inducing comedy about every conceivable thing going wrong for a character in the most horrific way possible (Martin Scorsese's After Hours is one example), but Mother, Couch isn't that kind of movie. It's based on a 2020 Swedish novel by Jerker Virdborg; perhaps something got lost in translation. David seems somewhat frantic about his mother's odd conundrum, but when he speaks to his wife (Lake Bell) about it, he sounds as if absolutely nothing is going on. Characters seem to bond in one scene and then are at each other's throats the next, with no rhyme or reason. And the family's history, as it's explained to us, doesn't make much sense, either.

That said, Swedish-born writer/director Niclas Larsson creates an affecting, unsettling atmosphere, with an even more unsettling sound design. He also gets fine performances from the great cast; F. Murray Abraham gets to push the envelope playing both owners of the furniture store, a pair of squabbling twins. But it's ultimately unclear what's really going on. Mother, Couch seems to celebrate family in some scenes and points an accusing finger at it in other scenes. Ultimately we're left without even so much as an indentation in the couch cushions of our moviegoing experience.