Marcy Learns Something New
2020 · 16m · USA
Directed by Julia Kennelly
A recently widowed woman, tired of the usual self-improvement routine, enrolls in a dominatrix workshop in search of empowerment and a new chapter after her husband's death.
Picked by Zoe
The scouts
Everyone expects this to be a cutesy empowerment romp or shock-value sex comedy—and Kennelly just... doesn't do that. She's too smart, too quiet, and that restraint is genuinely subversive in a way most films trying to be edgy could never pull off.
Kennelly's debt to the ensemble comedy tradition is evident—the workshop scenes have echoes of *Wanderlust*, *Bridesmaids*—but she elevates the form by refusing the easy laugh, instead situating grief and sexuality in a lineage of mature, unsentimental character work.
Dratch's choice to underplay it—that micro-expression when she first touches the equipment, the way she holds her body differently after the class—is what sells the whole thing; a lesser film would've screamed the epiphany, but Kennelly's camera trusts the actor enough to let it breathe in the spaces between dialogue.
Reviews
Threading a needle between a spare character portrait and a sex comedy, the film makes use of the inherent sensationalism of kink, but with a commitment to authenticity and respect for each character.
Kennelly has given Dratch her first real chance at finding breakthrough success.
Festivals
- Aspen Shortsfest 2020, Special Jury Mention - Comedy
- Palm Springs International Shortfest 2020
- Lower East Side Film Festival 2020, Best Live Action Short
- Atlanta Film Festival 2020
- Indie Memphis Film Festival 2020
- New Orleans Film Festival 2020