'Never Rarely Sometimes Always' tackles our failure of women's healthcare — Sundance review

Never Rarely Sometimes Always follows a teen girl from a small town as she journies to New York to get an abortion

Quick review: Never Rarely Sometimes Always is a matter-of-factly told abortion drama that pulls no punches as it takes on the failings of our healthcare system — especially for women. In theaters March 13th.

See all our reviews from the 2020 Sundance Film Festival here.

Director Eliza Hittman’s filmography is just three films deep, but her matter-of-fact style is as assured as an auteur with decades under their belt. That isn’t more apparent than with her new movie Never Rarely Sometimes Always, which premiered at the 2020 Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah this week.

Hittman has a long history with Sundance going back to 2011 and her short Forever’s Gonna Start Tonight. Since then, all three of her films — It Felt Like Love and Beach Rats are the others — have premiered there — and it feels like the perfect setting. Though all of her movies have been set and filmed in New York City, they’re all connected by naturalistic acting, teen angst, and an unadorned presentation. All qualities that feel right for a festival cast against snowcapped mountains and far from the business 

Like all her films, she follows a teen, this time a girl, undergoing a life-changing experience. Autumn (Sidney Flanigan), quiet but indignant, performs at her school’s talent show among singing trios and awkward musical theater numbers. The song she performs is about the pain and disappointments of love — we’ll soon learn that she’s pregnant and left to deal with it on her own, which makes the song all the more poignant.

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Her tiny Pennsylvania town clearly is not the progressive environment a teen in this situation would want to be in. When she goes to the local women’s clinic, the doctor, despite the best of intentions, clearly cautions against abortion as an option when Autumn shows interest. It’s clear from the brochures that only layout options that involve bringing the pregnancy to full term and an old video — probably on VHS — comparing abortion to murder.

Without many options in her small town, she and her cousin and best friend Skylar (Talia Ryder) make plans to travel to New York City to have the procedure despite their limited means. And this is when Never Rarely Sometimes Always really begins to come alive. 

When the pair arrive in the city it’s clear they’re out of their depths as tasks as simple as buying a MetroCard seem impossible to them. Then again, isn’t it for everyone? They face several setbacks that are quietly thrown their way — Hittman isn’t one for melodramatics — that they get through using their strong and tender bond. Flanigan plays Autumn close to the chest with rarely a moment that she reveals her feelings. Ryder’s Skylar, on the other hand, is full of warmth and energy that often gets them through their situation. Their relationship is what keeps you invested in the film. 

Hittman doesn’t preach. She simply lays out the facts of women’s access — or lack thereof — to healthcare in this country and sets juxtapositions to show just how ridiculous the process to get care is. It also shows the professionals following the law and those trying their best to work with it for the sake of the women affected. Along the way, toxic masculinity also sees its way around the pair with Autumn’s dad (Ryan Eggold) clearly having an unhealthy complex towards women and a young man (Théodore Pellerin), who offers to help the girls for a price. 

However, nothing is as effective or impactful as the film’s title scene where a particularly helpful doctor runs through a series of required questions about Autumn’s past to which she has to answer never, rarely, sometimes, always. The scene plays out in a single fixed shot that never strays from Autumn’s face with Flanigan doing some incredible work. During the scene, we finally see Autumn show emotion while also explaining why she feels the need to always hide them.

Never Rarely Sometimes Always is more than an overwrought drama about abortion. It’s more measured than that. It knows what it’s trying to say and know that it doesn’t need to do much work to say it. With two incredibly strong lead performances — and a quick cameo by Sharon Van Etten as Autumn’s mom — and a well-structured and tight screenplay, Eliza Hittman has pieced together an essential drama that further challenges the institutions that restrict the most vulnerable people in our society. More than that, it’s an empathetic look being a teenage girl.