Pieces of a Woman

The film is acutely perceptive on the effect of a bereavement on other people.

For the most part, Pieces of a Woman is a model of concentration and clout, fired up by actors of unstinting ardor.

In this emotional powerhouse about an expectant mother who experiences her worst nightmare, the brilliant Vanessa Kirby delivers a tour de force that will leave you shattered.

Those with the stomach for a forcefully acted representation of the gut-wrenching impact and long-range after-effects of sudden infant death will be rewarded with moments both powerful and affecting.

As fragmented as its title suggests, Pieces of a Woman contains parts of a good film, possibly a great one.

In Pieces of a Woman Kirby never seems to be building up artificial climaxes or big reveals; she works on a quieter, truer level. Too much going on around her ends up working against her.

Its effortful grandiosity transforms it into something hollow and even, at times, risible.

What an incredible piece of art. Vanessa Kirby does here an amazing and extraordinary performance, although Shia Labeouf is involved in some sh#@ things, here he does a great job too. Some people say that the first 30 minutes is really breathtaking but the other part of the film is not so good at all. But in my opinion, although I liked more the first 30 minutes, the film doesn't fail in the rhythm and the conduction of the story. 2020 must see film, watch!

to be honest i wasn't planning on watching this movie. the only reason i did was because of vanessa kirby's oscar nomination, but i must admit the directing and editing was really good. i feel like this would have been a really good court room drama with the other plot points spread throughout the film. p.s: they said MARTHA! in this way more times than in Batman v. Superman.

It reminded me of The Disappearance of Eleanor Rigby, although the focus on loss is entirely on the role and outstanding performance of Vanessa Kirby. Shia LaBeouf does a good job too, although I think this will be the last film we will see him in for a long time. Personally, I think it's a competent enough drama, but hardly the amazing drama that many critics have called it to be, and certainly the film can't respond with better results to its own pretensions. Is it worth it? Yes, but I think its critical success has led to misconceptions and misguided expectations about its overall quality.

(Mauro Lanari) Good times when in films a difficult birth didn't last 24 minutes or 126: in "Ordet" (1955) Dreyer solves it off-screen summarizing it with a skimpy line of dialogue, "He's lying in the tub, in four pieces". Good times, about a century ago, when still half the children died before their parents. Good times when cinema could afford not to be always and in any case a smug bourgeois self-reflection (nowadays is there anymore an audience stranger to this target?). Then, from Bergman to Moretti, Palme d'Or at Cannes 2001, up to the recent silliness of Baumbach, only tearjerker movies for wealthy "right-thinking people" (?).

[SPOILER ALERT: This review contains spoilers.]