Amy Adams’ latest horror comedy is based on one very weird book

When you hear about a movie titled Nightbitch, it’s only natural to be curious about its subject. So you dig a little deeper and find out Amy Adams stars in it. Finally, you watch the trailer, which reveals a bizarre plot about a woman who thinks she’s turning into a dog.

Okay, Nightbitch, you have my attention!

What is Nightbitch about?

You’ll probably think this is bonkers and something straight out of Yorgos Lanthimos’ filmography. But Nightbitch, starring the amazing Amy Adams, is a horror comedy from actor and filmmaker Marielle Heller, director of the Melissa McCarthy starrer Can You Ever Forgive Me? and the Fred Rogers biopic starring Tom Hanks, A Beautiful Day In The Neighbourhood. 

The film’s official logline from Searchlight Pictures reads, “A woman pauses her career to be a stay-at-home mom, but soon her domesticity takes a surreal turn.” In Nightbitch, Amy Adams plays a stay-at-home mom to a two-year-old son, struggling with loneliness and exhaustion. She’s reduced to taking care of every living being in her house, including her son, husband, and their pet, and it feels like the story of every woman who has had to be the default caregiver, putting her own life and dreams on hold for her family. But here’s where a twist arrives.

One night, she notices small changes in her, like sharper canine teeth, and eventually, she realizes that she is turning into a dog. (Yes, really). This revelation creates a whole new sense of power to tackle the beast that is motherhood! 

Is Nightbitch based on a book?

Nightbitch is based on a literary fiction novel of the same name by American author Rachel Yoder, who made her debut with this book in 2021. The novel, touted as an incisive, feral, feminist, and original take on contemporary womanhood, made it to several best book lists and won a number of accolades, too.

In July 2020, a year before the novel was published by Doubleday Books, a Deadline exclusive revealed that Annapurna Pictures had acquired the worldwide rights for Yoder’s unpublished novel in an auction and would be jointly producing it with Adams’ and Stacy O’Neil’s production house. 

The Hollywood Reporter offered an update on the film in 2022, stating that Marielle Heller would be writing, directing, and producing the film (via her company Defiant By Nature). Heller had connected with Yoder’s book and said that it took her breath away, and “Rachel’s darkly hilarious tale of motherhood and rage made me feel seen.” Production was to start tentatively in September of the same year, with the film going straight to streaming on Hulu.

Thankfully, instead, Nightbitch is ready to roll in the mud and bark loudly to rouse us all with a theatrical release. The trailer looks every bit as intriguing and weird as the premise promised and I cannot wait for the early reviews to come out of TIFF, with fingers crossed that they are good ones so that I can watch this feral movie with my fellow ladies on the big screen.

When will Nightbitch release in theatres?

An official trailer for Nightbitch was released on September 3, 2024, a few days before the film is set to premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival on September 7, 2024. Amy Adams is also a producer on the film under her production house Bond Group Entertainment, alongside Annapurna Pictures, her fifth collaboration with them after American Hustle, Her, The Master, and Vice. The film’s cast includes Scoot McNairy, Arleigh Patrick Snowden, Emmett James Snowden, Zoë Chao, Ella Thomas, Mary Holland, Jessica Harper, and Archana Rajan.

While the early reviews might be out soon after its September 6 premiere at TIFF, the rest of us will have to wait a bit to watch it. Nightbitch is slated for release on December 6, 2024.