Marin Ireland, Judy Reyes, A.J. Lister, and Breeda Wool star in Birth/Rebirth, the psychological horror film inspired by Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein.

In the film, also starring Monique Gabriela Curnen, Rina Mejia, Grant Harrison, and LaChanze, a single mother and a childless morgue technician are bound together by their relationship to a little girl they have reanimated from the dead.

Release Date

Directed by Laura Moss, Birth/Rebirth world premiered at the 2023 Sundance Film Festival; and opens in theaters with a release date of August 18.

Synopsis

Rose (Marin Ireland) is a pathologist who prefers working with corpses over social interaction. She also has an obsession — the reanimation of the dead. Celie (Judy Reyes) is a maternity nurse who has built her life around her bouncy, chatterbox six-year-old daughter, Lila (A.J. Lister). When one tragic night, Lila suddenly falls ill and dies, and the two women’s worlds crash into each other. They embark on a dark path of no return where they will be forced to confront how far they are willing to go to protect what they hold most dear.

Reviews

In their review from Sundance Film Festival, The Verge wrote, “Between its unflinching focus on the dangers of pregnancy and its depiction of the violence hidden throughout the US healthcare system, Birth/Rebirth might leave you feeling deeply unsettled. But as macabre as the movie gets, its grimness never comes close to feeling gratuitous, which is saying something given just how increasingly dark Birth/Rebirth becomes as its story unfolds.”

“At a time when shows like House of the Dragon have demonstrated how Hollywood still has a fondness for spotlighting the many ways that childbirth can kill women, Birth/Rebirth stands out as an example of how that reality can be depicted on-screen in all its horror without feeling voyeuristic or devoid of any substance. That’s not to say that Birth/Rebirth isn’t at times a difficult film to sit through — it definitely is — but the disconcerting sense of dread it leaves you feeling is crafted with the deftest of hands. It’s sure to be one of Shudder’s most talked-about movies when it debuts sometime later this year.”

Official Trailer

Watch the official trailer for Birth/Rebirth: