The Big Picture

John Early commands another chaotic role in
Stress Positions.

The film captures millennial New Yorkers’ lives during the early days of the COVID pandemic, revealing deep insecurities and absurdities.

Stress Positions
is humorous yet discomforting, skewering characters while painting an honest portrait.

If your movie ever needs a messy central figure around which to build, it’s hard to think of anyone better and more committed to playing them than John Early. Whether it was in the series Search Party, his recent comedy special Now More Than Ever, or basically anything he has ever done, he’s shown a wonderful ability to bring just the right amount of concentrated absurdity to make everything sing. Even as being goofy and unhinged is an underappreciated art that can be too easily dismissed as easy, or even worse, annoying just for the sake of it, when done well, it can really be something special. While such recognition matters little when the work already speaks for itself, that performances with a more comedic sensibility find themselves undervalued every year come awards season is still unfortunate as there is so much good work just waiting for its moment in the sun. Boy does it get it in Early’s latest.

Working alongside writer-director Theda Hammel, who also co-stars, Early is a chaotic embodiment of this once more in Stress Positions. First premiering back at this year’s Sundance Film Festival, it didn’t provide the most striking vision of the yearly event or the most unexpectedly sharp debut feature. However, it still did something perhaps even more impressive: it made a movie that was set during the pandemic that didn’t feel cloying and was instead among the few that were much more honest in their depiction of living through the crisis. In the case of Stress Positions, its entry point is a mostly insufferable group of millennial New Yorkers in the early days of the pandemic. Now getting a release through Neon, it’s no Do Not Expect Too Much from the End of the World in terms of how shattering a satire it is, but it still finds plenty of withering ways of its own to skewer its characters.

Stress Positions Release Date January 18, 2024 Director Theda Hammel Cast John Roberts , John Early , Theda Hammel , Amy Zimmer Runtime 95 minutes Main Genre Comedy Writers Faheem Ali , Theda Hammel

What Is ‘Stress Positions’ About?

Set primarily in a single brownstone in New York, the film mostly follows the seemingly constantly spiraling yet also privileged life of the ridiculously named Terry Goon (Early) as he takes care of his nephew Bahlul (Qaher Harhash), who has recently broken his leg. The juxtapositions between the two are immediately made obvious. Bahlul is a half-Moroccan model who is graceful and reflective, while Terry is a more self-centered white man currently trying to pretend he isn’t getting divorced from his ex-husband despite living in his house.

Also in the mix is Karla (Hammel), who is facing interpersonal struggles of her own. A trans woman whose life story was taken by her girlfriend Vanessa (Amy Zimmer) and made into a hit novel, she is currently contemplating ending the relationship. However, mostly, Karla just comes over to Terry’s and feeds his worst impulses as their time in quarantine starts to get even more anxiety-inducing. There is a whole heaping of angst bursting free from every frame, most of it giving voice to the internal struggles of the characters that they’re still all speaking about anyway. This proves increasingly effective via the drawn-out scenes of characters revealing much about themselves, even in ways they may not mean to.

Though there is plenty of noise that populates the film’s set-up and mumblecore-esque scenes, with Early giving an unabashedly chaotic physical performance that includes his impressive ability to fall, there is also something a bit more incisive lurking underneath when the film settles down. We repeatedly get glimpses of a delivery driver for Grubhub whose life is actually in a more precarious position than the majority of the main characters. Ronald, notably played by the film’s co-writer Faheem Ali, is working while everyone else seems to be in a comfortable enough place to stay at home. Even as you feel the stress as we see Early’s Terry frantically running around the house and growing increasingly sweaty, it is the more mundane reality of being a modern gig worker where we feel what the film is getting at.

‘Stress Positions’ Is a Pandemic Movie That Mostly Works

All of the characters who are semi-quarantining, save for perhaps Bahlul, are doing so with what ends up being relative freedom of movement while still remaining rather insulated from the realities of the world outside. It’s often rather funny, but the longer the film goes on, the more intentionally discomforting it becomes to see the jolts of hateful ignorance come bursting forth. Hammel demonstrates not just a sharp knowledge of how to capture the insecurities of all the characters that they would rather keep hidden but how to skewer them at the same time as making a character study. Even when it can risk falling into being a little repetitive and dulling its impact, it will swerve in just the right way to keep you on your toes.

Above all else, the film manages to be specific enough about elements of the pandemic to ring true while still getting into the particulars of its specific characters. A scene where Terry comes to the window to frantically express appreciation for the healthcare workers before getting right back into his day-to-day, self-centered existence is the gag that ties everything together. That it is all shot in a way that makes you feel claustrophobic has just as much to do with the confined spaces as it does the various players making their way through them. It’s a film that is like the disco ball that Terry is seen pushing down the stairs early on. Though plenty humorous, it is both oddly mesmerizing and increasingly frustrating. It’s like having a conversation with people you care about even as their respective egos increasingly suck up all the oxygen in the room, leaving you gasping for air just so you can get out one more laugh.

Stress Positions REVIEWTheda Hammel’s Stress Positions is exhausting and electrifying in equal measure with yet another great comedic performance by John Early.ProsOf all the films to be made about the pandemic, this is one that actually gets it right by never losing sight of the characters living through it.John Early gives yet another great perfromance, laying bare the insecurities and flaws of his messy character.While plenty funny, the film also works as a more withering satire about modern millennials that never pulls any punches. ConsSome elements of the film can teeter on the edge of being repetitive.

Stress Positions is in theaters in the U.S. starting April 19. Click below for showtimes near you.

GET TICKETS