If I Had Legs I'd Kick You (2025)
SHOULD I SEE IT?
YES
Rose Byrne gives a career-best performance - raw, unpredictable, and impossible to turn away from.
Unrelenting and intense, Mary Bronstein’s film never relaxes its grasp on you - a claustrophobic, emotional viewing experience.
Linda is a challenging main character, but her desperation to be seen and heard resonates and creates an anxious film stripped away of vanity and sentimental emotion.
NO
At times, If I Had Legs I’d Kick You is emotionally punishing; a hard film to recommend for most casual, multiplex moviegoers.
Certain key details in the story are left vague and ambiguous, frustrating those who expect more clarity in storytelling.
When I tell you this film feels claustrophobic, a vast majority of the film is shot in tight close-up on Byrne’s face or in close proximity to her body. We can’t get away. And this approach might make this a tough film to endure for viewers.
OUR REVIEW
Motherhood depicted as a psychological horror story is nothing new, but in If I Had Legs I’d Kick You, writer/director Mary Bronstein creates an often suffocating, unrelentingly tense film that threatens to consume a woman named Linda from the inside out.
In a fiercely committed performance, Rose Byrne, well known for her comedic timing and sensibilities as an actor, delivers a commanding dramatic performance, the best of her career, and holds us close as we navigate a bleak and often uncomfortable viewing experience.
This is all by design. Bronstein shows little hesitation in offering Linda as someone who appears, from the outside looking in, a broken and struggling mother. Yet as we follow her through a “typical” day, she is frequently seen but seldom heard. Linda is fighting for space and agency in her own world. Marginalized by her peers and berated on the phone by her often-absent husband (Christian Slater), she is made to feel like nothing she does is ever good enough.
A therapist, Linda often seeks counsel from a colleague (Conan O’Brien) who tries to tolerate her combative nature and show patience. Raising a young daughter (Delaney Quinn), whose illness is so severe she cannot attend school, Linda often argues and disagrees with her child’s doctor (Bronstein) on recommended treatment plans and a path moving forward.
Early in the film, Linda and her daughter return home to find their house flooded and a massive ceiling leak creates a substantial hole. Needing repairs, Linda and her daughter are moved to a nearby motel as repairs are supposed to be made. With her husband gone on a months-long work trip, Linda has to navigate her daughter’s care alone. Though we never see her face, her daughter’s voice is omnipresent - youthful but demanding, dependent on needs and care. Fed nightly through a tube, with her vitals monitored at all times, Linda’s moments of peace come when her daughter falls asleep each night.
Bronstein shows us a woman on the verge of a breakdown but still trying to hold together the broken pieces of her life. Whether you see her as selfish or a survivor, the choices Linda makes are often hard to accept. After moving to the motel, Linda develops a nightly routine of buying a bottle of wine from the motel grocery, sneaking away to drink and smoke each night after her daughter falls asleep. James (A$AP Rocky), the motel’s super, notices her and tries to befriend her, leading to something of a combative, fleeting friendship.
The cycle often repeats. When shown kindness, Linda can destroy it. When questioned, she becomes fiercely defensive. Her obsession with the hole in her ceiling grows, as does her emotional vacancy and damaged psyche.
Bronstein’s filmmaking approach is uncompromising. Cinematographer Christopher Messina often keeps the camera inches from Linda’s face or physical being. We cannot escape Linda’s closeness, just as she cannot escape everything closing in around her. And while discomfort is the point, one does wonder how a more mainstream moviegoing audience will react to a film crafted in such a way.
Byrne is remarkable here, digging deep and creating someone feral, fierce, and unapologetic with her actions. Linda is desperately hopelessly alone and Byrne creates someone you both fear and have empathy for. She pushes your boundaries, challenges you for acceptance, and creates a character we cannot soon forget.
If I Had Legs I’d Kick You is not a film that plays nice or gives us a soft landing. There’s rage and anger here, and also a sense of being overwhelmed and on the verge of giving up. We feel Linda’s exhaustion and even when she cracks a joke or offers a witty aside, she is a woman who seems on the cusp of collapse.
Linda didn’t ask for this. She wanted to be a mother, start a family, and build a successful career. She wanted, at least at one time, to give and receive love. However, when we meet her, she feels abandoned by the world around her. The impulsiveness, her selfish actions - everywhere she turns, she is told what to do, how to think, and reminded of the errors in her ways. Then, she perpetuates those things by her very actions - delivering on a sad, but perhaps not uncommon, self-fulfilling prophecy.
CAST & CREW
Starring: Rose Byrne, Delaney Quinn, Conan O’Brien, Danielle Macdonald, A$AP Rocky, Christian Slater, Ivy Wolk, Daniel Zolghadri
Director: Mary Bronstein
Written by: Mary Bronstein
Release Date: October 17, 2025
A24