If I Had Legs I'd Kick You

"The film is a tonal rollercoaster navigating wild swings with pinpoint precision."

— Marshall Shaffer, Slant Magazine

"It’s the kind of film that makes you want to call your own mother and apologize."

— David Fear, Rolling Stone

"Only a film this forthright can have such power. Bronstein and Byrne’s dual honesty is as affecting as it gets."

— Coleman Spilde, Salon.com

"Wrenching and at times suffocating, “If I Had Legs I’d Kick You” is a howl of maternal desperation spiked with jagged humor."

— Jeannette Catsoulis, New York Times

"Emotionally unrelenting and distressing but Mary Bronstein makes room for humour, warmth and humanity, all of which is found in Byrne's incredible performance."

— Radheyan Simonpillai, CBC Radio

"I just know that Bronstein demands you pay attention to her, and with Byrne diving headfirst into the character’s harrowing panic, you will find you have no other choice."

— Glenn Whipp, Los Angeles Times

"A tour de force of matriarchal fury from Byrne, who fuels Linda with both a groaning air of despair and the rising hackles of a woman who will not be ridden roughshod over."

— Stephen A. Russell, Time Out

"This pitch-black comedy drama in which a heroic Rose Byrne stars as a working mother having the worst month ever starts with the intensity cranked to 11 and stays there for the entire running time."

— Ty Burr, Ty Burr's Watch List (Substack)

"Motherhood becomes a psychological battleground in writer-director Mary Bronstein’s gripping second feature, which casts Rose Byrne as a working parent unable to slow her downward spiral."

— Tim Grierson, Screen International

"If I Had Legs I’d Kick You is hardly full-on punishment, and in places it’s bitterly funny. But in the end, it’s an enormous relief to walk away from Linda’s problems. Our own don’t seem so bad in comparison."

— Stephanie Zacharek, TIME Magazine

"This is a film that is as witheringly funny as it is disquieting, frequently teetering right on the edge of horror as we feel what seems like the very fabric of the world it creates coming completely apart before our eyes."

— Chase Hutchinson, TheWrap

"Delivering a feverish, raw-nerve performance sure to go down as one of the year’s greats, Byrne has never had a role even remotely this intense to prepare us for the kind of emotional acrobatics her writer-director has in store."

— Peter Debruge, Variety

"The kind of film in which the things that should be scary are funny, and the things that should be funny are terrifying. The premise itself is every parent’s worst nightmare, but it’s shaped in a way that makes it feel like a cosmic joke."

— David Ehrlich, IndieWire

"It’s a towering performance, a feat of intelligence and energy that tightly binds to all of Bronstein’s heady, propulsive style. Let’s hope Byrne gets recognized for all of that hard work in some fashion, even if Linda never gets credit for hers."

— Richard Lawson, Vanity Fair