Look Both Ways

Netflix's split-life film. On the eve of her college graduation Natalie takes a pregnancy test in a bathroom, and from there the film follows two parallel tracks: the one where it is positive and she stays in Texas and becomes a mother, and the one where it is negative and she moves to Los Angeles to chase a career in animation. Director Wanuri Kahiu is Kenyan, known for Rafiki, and this is her first Hollywood project. The script was April Prosser's first sale. It was shot in Austin in the summer of 2021. Its visual trick is using colour and light to separate the two lives: the two strands are never in the same register, so the viewer never has to work out which branch they are in. Lili Reinhart plays Natalie, with Danny Ramirez, Aisha Dee, David Corenswet, Luke Wilson and Nia Long. Who it is for: viewers who want a soft, well-meant and well-played story about a fork in the road. Who it is not for: anyone waiting for one of the two branches to actually go badly. The film keeps both lives livable; the stakes stay low, and that was the main thing critics caught on.