Birth Movie Review

Birth (2004)

Buy Birth on Amazon Video
Written by: Jean-Claude Carrière & Milo Addica & Jonathan Glazer (written by)
Directed by: Jonathan Glazer
Starring: Nicole Kidman, Cameron Bright, Lauren Bacall, Danny Huston, Anne Heche, Peter Stormare
Rated: R
Watch the trailer

Plot
A young boy attempts to convince a woman that he is her dead husband reborn.

Verdict
This is a cool concept. The love of your life is reincarnated, which is great... except he's a twelve year old boy. How much can you ignore? Are you willing to violate social norms? It's a great question that makes you think. This is a journey, and the movie is worth it for that alone, but the end is just awesome.
This ends and I'm puzzled for an answer that I feel the movie gave me that I must have missed. What it tells me, I don't buy. The pieces are there and I skimmed through this again to put the pieces together.
Watch it.

Review
Director Jonathan Glazer also did Sexy Beast (my review) and Under the Skin (my review). This movie is definitely a trip, more like Under the Skin.
This kid shows up and tells Anna he is her dead husband. Of course Anna is incredulous, but this kid has details that he shouldn't know. This gets crazy, because reincarnated or not, it's still a kid and I wondered how far Anna would go. While it seems to be her husband, he's also not. This explore the question of whether true love can go beyond appearances, age, and even social norms. How much can you ignore in the name of love? How do you make that relationship work?

It's such a neat concept. Anna wants to believe the kid. She wants to believe her late husband is alive, but she's becoming irrational. Is the kid legitimate or does she just want to believe? The kid is a sliver of hope.
These are characters that aren't over the top. They have doubts, they're skeptical. There's an amazing sequence where we see Anna process this information. She ultimately chooses to believe.
The kid, doesn't say much. He's a blank slate that allows us to attribute a lot of feelings to him. The actor does a great job though.

It's impressive how ambiguous this becomes, whether this kid is a reincarnation or not. Once this ended, I skimmed through this again looking for clues. I didn't like how this ended and wasn't sure what actually happened. I knew the ending presented couldn't be it. I was puzzled, and while some movies I write off, I knew this one was smart enough and well done enough that it gave me the pieces. I just hadn't seen them. I watched parts of this again, and I have a theory below.

SPOILERS

This ends with the kid stating "I can't be Shawn because he loved another woman and I love Anna."
We discover that Clara buried a package of love letters from Shawn, with whom she was having an affair. She did this in the beginning of the movie, we didn't realize what was happening or what was in that package.
The movie posits that the kid dug up the letters and that's how he knew so many details about Anna. That doesn't explain how he knew where Shawn died, that wouldn't be in the letters.
As proof that the kid is a fake Clara tells him, he would have come to her first as she was his true love. As we saw the kid revealed his identity to Anna first, BUT he first was observing Clara in the lobby, followed her and saw her bury the letters. Why would he follow a random woman? He knew her.

The kid was Shawn reincarnated. He went to Clara first, watching her. When he saw her bury the letters he dug them up and realized how much Anna loved him. It was a realization of his mistake, of what he missed. He waited until the next day to go to Anna, but he was at her place the previous night. Why did he wait? I think he was making a decision.

His statement that Shawn loved another woman and he loves Anna is true. His former self loved Clara, but after reading the letters he loves Anna. He tells Clara when she confronts him about the letters to not tell Anna. Why would he care if he's a fake? Why would he care what happened if this was all a game?
If he tells Anna the truth about the affair, it hurts her, a pain worse than his death. If he tells Anna he's now Shawn, she's mad and disappointed, but not crushed. She'll feel silly she ever fell for it. He does have to live with that, the secret, but that is his sacrifice to protect her. He loves her, again.
If it was a lie, he never acted like a kid. Why would he lie and go to such lengths? Is it just coincidence he encountered Clara and Anna? I don't think so. It's awesome that the movie is so ambiguous, but provides us all the pieces.