Jerri is forced to confront her worldview and perceptions of the post-war, mid-century life that she advocates a return to, when she wakes up as her own mother, Sylvia (played in the 2024 bookending of the story by Linda Darlow). Oh and Jerri/Sylvia is pregnant with herself. Dealing with her mother’s experiences and an interiority she never understood was there, Jerri also has to parent herself growing up. How’s that for a twist on acknowledging and trying to heal your inner child? While the framing of the film is Jerri in her late 60s, preparing to move her 88 year-old mother to Florida, the core of the film is a meditation on a very common experience from 40 years earlier. As children we leave adolescence for adulthood, we then start to see our parents in a new light. Not as our parents but as flawed humans. We reflect on our upbringing and remember how our parents made us feel. These realizations can then crystallize how we relate to our parents for the rest of our, or their, lives. Jerri both as a child, and an adult, is an angry person. This is likely why she succeeds in the grievance politics-laden news cycle. Yet, Jerri, as she (as Sylvia) explains to someone, is angry to hide her hurt. As I was watching the movie, one of my notes asked whose nightmare I was watching. Jerri living her mom’s life, or her mom raising Jerri. Queens for a Day is equal measures social commentary, horror movie, and fairy tale. Jerri is very much a Scrooge type figure, but the question remains throughout the film – will she be transformed by her experience? Will she realize that her assumptions both about her mother, their shared past, and even her politics are reprehensible?
This review, and my screening started with a Chris Carter quote about the movie being a ‘true independent.” In many ways that is true. The film, at the time of this writing, is working on distribution. With very little time available, the film was completely prepped in 6 weeks and was a tight 32 day shoot. Erin Boyes shared at the Q&A that from being cast as the lead to being in front of the camera shoot was only nine days. So much of the film hinges on Boyes performance, and the ways to titrate when she’s Jerri and giving into the reality of the situation and culture around her or giving into the Sylvia of it all. Knowing that she had so little runway to prep for that makes the already impressive performance feel like a herculean success as a result.