During their birth scenes, both Knocked Up and Pieces of a Woman attempt to show two different experiences of what birth can look like. However, the birth scene functions differently in both movies. Knocked Up follows a familiar storyline of an accidental pregnancy and a couple who eventually reconciles during the birth of their child at the end of the movie. Pieces of a Woman features the birth scene of a loving couple at the beginning of the movie that goes wrong and later leads to the dissolution of the couple.
Despite this, the different scenes share a few similarities. In both movies, the original doctor is unavailable. In Knocked Up, Allison had a birth plan with her original doctor, but he was away at a Bar Mitzvah. Her and her partner have to find another doctor as she is going into labor. Once at the hospital, Allison does not like the way her new doctor is treating her and that he does not want to respect her birth plan. Her partner, Ben, talks privately with the doctor and asks him to be nice to her. The doctor states twice during this part of the movie that his purpose is to “get the baby out safely.” His view of his job does not leave much space for the mother’s wishes. He often talks down to her or tells her what she needs to do. Although the movie does not resolve the way that the doctor treats Allison, it is clear that Allison and Ben are unhappy with the doctor’s bedside manner. When she began labor, before she went to the hospital, Allison stated to Ben that she wanted to have a calm birthing environment. Twice during the birth, Ben removes people from the room to have a difficult conversation. He works to respect her wishes to have a calm space and works to get the doctor to also respect her wishes.
In Pieces of a Woman, the original midwife is at a different birth and unavailable to assist Martha, so a different midwife has to come help them. Martha is initially not happy but seems to accept the new midwife eventually. In a similar fashion to Knocked Up, Martha has a plan for how she wants her birth to go, and it is understandably upsetting to have that taken away. However, because her baby passes away shortly after she is born, the characters’ feelings about the midwife are more complicated. Although Martha herself does not seem to blame the midwife, other members of her family like her mother and husband want to prosecute her. In both movies, the doctor and midwife are a point of complication, but the situation of the story changes how they were viewed in the end.
In both movies, the woman have a birth plan that includes natural childbirth. Both movies show the woman in a lot of distress and pain as they go into labor. At one point both women ask for painkillers or an epidural. Knocked Up is famous for its graphic depiction of the baby crowning, which contributes to the obvious effort of the movie to have a more realistic depiction of giving birth. She is shown going into labor, pushing, and the baby is shown immediately after giving birth. Pieces of a Woman shows a similar amount of the birth. Obviously, Martha is giving birth at home, unlike Allison who gave birth in the hospital, but Pieces of a Woman shows labor and the baby without showing the graphic shot. Both movies aim to present a longer, more complete story of giving birth while omitting any gore. In addition, both movies leave out everything that happens after the baby is born such as delivering the placenta. Knocked Out completely leaves out the postpartum experience because the movie ends, and Pieces of a Woman has a scene of her wearing a postpartum underwear but focuses more on the grief than her postpartum experience. These two experiences bring up interesting questions of a woman’s autonomy during birth. In Pieces of a Woman, they do not explain why Martha chose a homebirth. However, Knocked Up could highlight some of the reasons why a woman would want a homebirth. When Allison is in the hospital, the doctor does not prioritize her experience or her wishes. He does not listen to her and often speaks to her male partner instead. Conversely, the mannerisms of the midwife in Pieces of a Woman speaks and responds more to Martha. However, even during Martha’s experience there is not perfect communication. The question of homebirth in controversial and involves many different factors, but one of the most important debates centers around the autonomy of the mother and her right to decide how she wants to give birth.
Knocked Up, dir. Judd Apatow, 2007
Pieces of a Woman, dir. Kornél Mundruczó, 2020.
by Amelia Aplikowski
Budapest through Streets, People and Cinema 