A New Mom’s Honest Review Of Lili Reinhart’s Netflix Movie ‘Look Both Ways’

To summarize the movie without giving away any major spoilers, Lili Reinhart plays Natalie Bennett, who on the night of her college graduation finds herself taking a pregnancy test. The movie jumps back and forth between two parallel realities. In one, the test is positive and she puts off her pursuit of a career in animation to navigate motherhood in her hometown of Austin, TX. She does so alongside her daughter’s father, Gabe, who was a friend she had a casual one-night stand with. The other in which she moves to LA with her best friend to pursue her dream career in animation and falls in love with a guy named Jake.

It Had It’s Progressive Moments, but Not As Many As You’d Expect

Upon watching the movie, I braced for a lot of loud pro-choice rhetoric that would likely distract me from the actual premise of the movie but was pleasantly surprised that only two small parts of the film even hinted at abortion. When Nat first tells Gabe that she’s pregnant, his response is “I’m pro your choice.” The next morning, Nat reveals to her best friend that she is going to have the baby, which leads to her surprising her parents with the news the next morning instead of moving to LA as she had originally planned to do.

The bizarre thing, however, was her parents’ response to the big news. They completely freaked out as if she were a 15-year-old teen mom and not a 22-year-old college graduate. They began to yell at her and scowl at Gabe, while whining over the things that they as empty nesters would have to give up with a baby back in the house, like “No more naked Sundays.” They do seem to press Nat on whether she has considered “other options,” given that she worked so hard to get her college degree and pursue her dreams and now her life will never be the same. (Because moms with college degrees have never been able to use them, of course.) 

Throughout the rest of the movie, her parents are portrayed as pretty affluent, extremely loving, supportive parents, which is why this scene truly shocked me – I find it very difficult to picture parents like this pressuring their pretty responsible adult daughter to abort their grandchild. But then I found myself reflecting on how self-absorbed Millennials and Gen Zers can be compared to past generations, and it kind of made sense. Many of us have been either nurtured or conditioned to believe that our personal ambitions and desires matter more than anything else, whether that is because of what society is constantly telling us or perhaps the way that our parents raised us. Thankfully, for the sake of her daughter and for the sake of the storyline, Nat has no doubt that she wants to keep the baby.

An Entertaining but Realistic Portrayal of a Young Mom and Young Career Woman

As a new mom myself and also someone who once moved to LA to pursue my dream career, I ironically resonated with both versions of Nat. I think the film did a fair and honest job of portraying both the great and challenging things about motherhood, especially during the first year, which is often filled with sleepless nights, hard-to-control mood swings, battling personal insecurities about your new body, and feeling like you’ve even lost your sense of self since you don’t have much time to enjoy your friends or hobbies anymore.

However, I think the film also did a great job portraying the many positive things about new motherhood, such as the sentimental moments of bonding. One sweet moment in the film is when Gabe and Natalie joke about their baby girl being a “Night Owl” because she stays up all night consumed by the many things she has to do the next day, and they joke about them, which turns their exhaustion into laughter. This jovial exchange ultimately inspires Nat to animate a cartoon about the “Night Owl,” which propels her back into drawing and pursuing her animation career.

The second version of Nat in LA, who is dating a hot new guy and working under her dream mentor at a top animation studio, also gave an accurate portrayal of the real working world I believe. Despite pursuing her dreams immediately upon graduating, she quickly learns that the straightforward path is not quite all it’s cracked up to be, and after breaking up with her boyfriend and not so subtly being pushed out of what she thought was her dream job, she ends up losing sight of the meaning in her life and finds herself back home starting over again.

I won’t spoil the ending, but overall, it had a very powerful message which was that whether you’re pursuing a career as a single young woman or as a single mom, you can still achieve your dreams. Each path may be different given your circumstances, but each path will get you to exactly where you're meant to be in life. Overall, the movie felt extremely empowering and inspiring for women, and I would highly recommend it for an enjoyable movie that can make you laugh, cry, and warm your heart.

But What Do Actual Movie Critics Think?

Interestingly enough, though, I can’t say most mainstream movie critics would agree with my review or recommendation of the film. After watching the film and seeing so many positive reviews from viewers being shared on social media, I found myself on the infamous Rotten Tomatoes site where the Audience Score was 85% (which is pretty dang good), while the Tomatometer Critics Score was 53%. 

Natalie Winkelman from the New York Times said, “It's jarring to see Natalie’s unplanned pregnancy introduced as a cool dose of reality rather than a decision to be made, and the movie’s post-Roe release only adds insult to injury.” Another critic claimed it was a “complete divorce from the reality facing women’s reproductive rights.” Unfortunately, reviews like this are not surprising when abortion is considered more empowering than motherhood by many. 

After reading these reviews, I remembered that a movie came out just two years ago called Unpregnant, where a teenager travels across state lines to get an abortion, and ironically it has a 15% audience score on Rotten Tomatoes (with more than 2,500+ reviews), yet a 91% Tomatometer Critics Score (with only 46 reviews). The critics' reviews describe the protagonist in that movie’s decision to abort “admirable” and rave about how “important women’s liberation issues are (in this case abortion)… and should be applauded.” 

Closing Thoughts

The contradiction between the critics’ reviews of these completely polar opposite films were fascinating yet a bit disappointing because I believe they reflect where we are in today’s society. Radical feminists that have infiltrated most mainstream culture, including film, have been conditioned to believe that abortion is empowerment while motherhood is not, when in fact the opposite is true. Mothers who have balanced raising strong families while pursuing their careers are not only empowering but admirable, and I hope they become more prevalent mainstream role models for young women. Thankfully the audience reviews seem to reflect that many people in the general public share this sentiment, and I hope this movie’s powerful message pours out into the hearts of young women everywhere.

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