Review: ‘Tuesday’ is a dark fairy tale led by a staggeringly good Julia Louis-Dreyfus

Those of us movie critics fortunate enough to be in this line of work are always trying to squeeze another two hours or so out of the week to catch one more new film. Because you never know. Which is to say: I’m extremely happy to have seen “Tuesday,” which demands and receives new and challenging things from Julia Louis-Dreyfus while announcing a formidable new filmmaker, the Croatian writer-director Daina O. Pusić.

Now for the fantastical aspect of “Tuesday.” The first character we meet in Pusić’s story is a macaw, in fact a Macaw of Death. With a brief, calm wave of its wing, Death brings the end to humans whose laments Death has heard, and will heed. This grubby but remarkable bird, badly in need of a bath and some peace, has a difficult time tuning out Earth’s perpetual chorus of lamentation.

For a time, Tuesday and Death find solace in each other’s temporary company. Shrinking down, the macaw enjoys a badly needed bath in Tuesday’s bathroom sink. Tuesday plays one of her favorite songs, Ice Cube’s “It Was a Good Day,” which turns out to be a favorite of Death’s, too. They get high, in a scene not played for the kind of laugh you might expect, even from an off-center, A24-distributed picture.

The movie scatters and, here and there, stumbles a bit in its second half. And yet the spell never broke for me. The everyday heartbreak, such as Louis-Dreyfus’s startled, shaken non-verbal reaction to the taxidermist’s casual question about the age of her daughter, makes “Tuesday” a very full experience. Louis-Dreyfus is wonderful in this, ready for anything, never soft-pedaling her character’s flaws or panic or fear. Lola Petticrew makes Tuesday both compelling and admirable in her directness.

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