Four Good Days

A film set in America. Deb has counted her daughter lost for ten years. Molly is at the door. Back again, wrecked again, asking for help again. Her mother does not open it. Then she does. Molly is an addict. She has been through treatment more than ten times and returned each time. There is an option at the clinic. An injection; it blocks the addiction and lasts for months. There is a condition. The patient must be entirely clean for four days before the shot. From there the film follows those four days. Molly stays at the house. Her mother watches her, takes her phone, and does not let her out. The two talk. It does not begin well. The mother accuses. The daughter lies. Then both of them tell a little of the truth. One section takes place at a school. Molly goes into a class and tells her own story, and that scene is the film's centre. What the narrative is interested in is not addiction but trust: its idea is that the mother wants to believe her daughter and cannot, and that the four days are really an examination. The mother is flawed too. She gave her daughter up long ago and will not admit it to herself. The stepfather is a quiet layer. He leaves the decision to the mother and does not intervene. The ending gives no easy victory. The story comes from a newspaper article about a mother and daughter going through the same process. Glenn Close and Mila Kunis are together in almost every scene. Rodrigo García directed. Who it is for: anyone who likes two-hander drama and stories about addiction. Who it is not for: anyone looking for hope; the narrative is heavy and keeps its resolution suspended to the end.