Birdeater

Reawaken in Fright

Just to get this out of the way: The “birdeater” is a spider — a type of tarantula that is one of the largest spiders in the world, close to a foot across and, yes, big enough to eat a bird. Birdeater is, after all, set in Australia, that land of wonderful, horrible nature. It’s a metaphor here for everything that eats away at women’s self-confidence and keeps them from reaching their full potential. Not that either gender escapes unscathed in this emotionally and sometimes physically brutal feature debut from the Aussie writing-directing team of Jack Clark and Jim Weir.

Bride-and-groom-to-be Irene (Shabana Azeez) and Louie (Mackenzie Fearnley) are already entangled in a solid year’s worth of relationship issues, not one of which is being discussed. That’s page one of the book of how not to keep your relationship healthy. All this not-talking has caused Irene to develop intense separation anxiety: She has panic attacks if she doesn’t know where Louie is, and manages those attacks through the use of dubious pills. And her condition is deteriorating.