Unicorn Store

Childhood fantasies spill like pixie dust into boring old reality in Academy Award–winning actor Brie Larson's charming feature directorial debut. In this story of a young woman's belated coming of age, however, fantasies can prove complicated.

Kit (Larson) is a die-hard dreamer, an artist whose canvases are riddled with rainbows and glitter. Unfortunately, art school doesn't want her, and her New Age parents (Joan Cusack and Bradley Whitford) feel it's time she grew up. Kit gets a temp gig at an ad agency and it seems she's finally surrendered herself to inevitable adulthood. But then along come a series of mysterious invitations to a hidden store, where a cheerful salesman in a shiny pink suit (Samuel L. Jackson) offers her something she's spent her whole life waiting for: her very own unicorn. The one condition is that Kit must prove she's responsible enough to take care of her magical pet. With the help of a new friend, Virgil (TIFF 2017 Rising Star Mamoudou Athie), Kit gets to work constructing a stable — but can this promise of a fabled creature really come true?

Witty and irreverent, the director–screenwriter combo of Larson and Samantha McIntyre brings audiences a refreshing, unapologetically quirky perspective on existential crisis, a topic particularly dominated by male filmmakers. The world might be especially challenging for people like Kit, but it would be a whole lot less fun without them — or their unicorns — around.

KERRI CRADDOCK