“Tuesday” (2023) is the name of a cancer stricken fifteen-year-old (Lola Petticrew). Death (Arinze Kene) appears in the form of a bird who can change size (think Ant-Man) and can hear when the living are dying. With a wave of its wing, Death comes to relieve them of their pain and suffering, but it means a despised and solitary existence for Death. Though frightened, Tuesday welcomes Death and offers her hospitality, which leads Death to make a few concessions, giving Zora (Julia Louis-Dreyfus), Tuesday’s mom, a chance to try and outwit Death and save her daughter. Zora’s wiliness comes with a few complications. Will Zora get through the stages of grief fast enough to finally hear her daughter’s plea to let her go?

I saw “Tuesday” because I was invited to the screening, and I love Louis-Dreyfus. If I had paid closer attention to the premise, I probably would not have gone because the idea of a talking, colorful bird personifying death seems ridiculous, but it works thanks to Kene’s superb vocal acting and VFX creators Mike Stillwell and Andrew Simmonds who are responsible for designing Death’s look. Saying that he looks like a parrot (or a macaw) really does not do him justice and seems too saccharine. Perhaps if a parrot got a vulture makeover and was on the evolution rung as close to dinosaur as possible while still belonging to the aves’ biological class, then that parrot would look like a feathered Grim Reaper. His blue eyes and thick beak make him terrifying, and Kene’s voice sounds gravelly and hoarse with the weight of disuse and time. Kene evokes the burden of his calling, but Death’s physicality denotes a grace and gentleness in the execution of his task which shows that he is the right one for the job. When a woman spits at him, he does not lash out. Later it is obvious that physical cruelty is an option in his bag of tricks though he would prefer not to use it.

So when Tuesday meets Death, it becomes sweet, and considering that she is not a little girl, but a teenager, it takes some deft handling to avoid heartwarming moments of charming Death with cutesy moments, which would rob the film of its gravity. Tuesday is not a Camille type who is dying in a photogenic manner. Director and writer Daina Oniunas-Pusic makes her feature debut by mixing as much realism into the fantastical plot. Under different circumstances, Death and Tuesday would be friends. There is a running theme that Tuesday has a gift at calming anxious people down, which packs an emotional wallop in the denouement. While it strains credulity that Death would need soothing and an emotional coregulator, after seeing the opening sequence and witnessing Death’s prior tasks, which lead to brief physical strain, it makes sense. Their friendship feels plausible, and as long as Death and/or Tuesday are onscreen, the movie feels rooted in a full range of emotion. Death gets to appreciate life and camaraderie instead of snuffing it out, and Tuesday has someone who does not ignore her situation.

“Tuesday” falters when Death takes a back seat, and the story turns to Zora. Don’t blame Louis-Dreyfus, who explores some hitherto fore untrod emotional territory like a fierce, ruthless, and primal instinct to protect her kid and avoid reality. Zora sticks out in a film filled predominantly with relatively unknown British actors. In severe denial over her daughter’s impending death, even with Death delivering the news, Zora keeps secrets from Tuesday and plays pretend everything is fine. When Zora stops ducking her daughter and starts being transparent, the film gets interesting, but then the human drama gets interrupted for something a little flashier than money concerns and grief. At this point, the film needed to be shorter because her journey takes on an apocalyptic “Gulliver’s Travels” vibe that works theoretically and visually but feels shakier than the simpler revelations set in her multi-level house. The mother and daughter go on a journey to help clean up the work that Death missed while with them; however, without Death present, the story gets a bit predictable and loses some tension.

The depiction of a world waiting for Death feels a little cheap and anonymous. The magical realism element is uneven when it expands beyond the feathered creature. Cecil B. DeMille’s “The Ten Commandments” plagues are safe even though this film has more technological tools at its disposal, and the handful of walking dead, not zombies, just living beings who should be dead, felt sparse. Why are the dead only victims of gruesome accident instead of just reaching their expiration date? It felt a bit sensationalistic and wildly veered from an overall grounded tone than the rest of the movie. Also all the streets are deserted as if “Tuesday” was a sidequel to “I Am Legend” (2007) except for the characters that were introduced earlier in the story. It felt as if Oniunas-Pusic took a more exploitive route, which I enjoyed, to ensure that viewers would stay invested by mixing genres into the more sober tale.

The inherent tension in “Tuesday” is how can you kill someone that you love more than yourself or allow them to die. Zora’s road trip with Tuesday makes her appreciate that death is a gift—the “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” reference is intentional. The allegory goes on a little long. The attitude to the primeval bird becomes a literal Rorschach test to feelings about mortality. While I almost cried, I still didn’t because it took a long time to get there, and then it is one of those movies where the final scenes lay out what just unfolded to make sure that everyone walks away understanding the lesson, which is tiresome; however, the way that Oniunas-Pusic does it works.

Death can speak in the voices of others as if he recorded the initial delivery from the original speaker. This ability packs power in the denouement, especially for me. Hearing the voice of a dearly departed loved one is a particular type of solace during the grieving process. It is a nice call back to an earlier scene and transforms into an admonishment about how to live after losing someone.

I watched “Tuesday” (2023) after watching “Janet Planet” (2023) during the Independent Film Festival Boston. It is interesting that both films focus on a single mother and daughter without any allusion to a father. The absence of the father is not the only notable aspect of the narrative. There is no need to explain his unavailability. It does not hurt the story, and human men do not play pivotal roles or exist as three-dimensional characters who can live without the main characters. It is the opposite of the expected cinematic landscape.

If you are not a fan of allegories, skip “Tuesday,” but don’t let the bird turn you off. It is still a sweet though overly long narrative that tackles the universal problem of facing mortality and loss. If you are a fan of the cast, definitely check it out, and looking forward to seeing Kene play an onscreen person to see if he remains the cornerstone presence in another film.