Human-animal relationships are mutually beneficial. Feeding a pet is a reason to get out of bed in the morning; Taking them out is an excuse to get dressed, go outside and get some sun. And although she did not ask for the responsibility and took care of a sweet, fluffy white rabbit With huge eyes is exactly what the main character of Katarina Zhu’s “Bunny leave“Needs.
Rebecca (ZHU) is having what you might call a quarter-life crisis. Almost friendless and struggling to pay rent, she supplements her income as a personal assistant with the money she makes chatting with guys and posting pictures of her feet on a camming website. It is one of her clients who actually sends her the rabbit; It’s a strange thing to do, and given the violent sex-work arc stories that often take over the media, the anticipation is sickening when Rebecca turns on her webcam to chat with John (Austin Amelio). His interest in rabbits seems to be…unusual.
But “Bunnylovr” isn’t the wild thriller it suggests it might be. Zhu tacitly acknowledges this tension late in the story, when Rebecca goes on bad advice to a horror film: The man’s hand creeps up Rebecca’s thigh as a woman screams for help on the soundtrack, unseen but jarring to hear. Rebecca, meanwhile, stares transfixed at the screen, as if contemplating her fate if she continues down this self-destructive path. She then gets up and runs out of the theater, because this is not that kind of movie.
To be clear, there is a harrowing scene involving the rabbit, which Rebecca names Milk. But it’s more of a turning point for Rebecca’s character than for the kind of movie we’re watching. While Rebecca undergoes a (quiet) transformation, “Bunnylovr” remains subtle throughout, using its protagonist as a stand-in for urban alienation and Internet-age loneliness writ large. As Rebecca, Zhu is hesitant and indecisive. She has nowhere to be, but is always late anyway. She looks like she has something to say, but when she starts to speak, she fumbles uneasily, saying too much and nothing at the same time.
Rebecca has an IRL friend, a privileged painter named Bella (Rachel Sennott) Who doesn’t even seem to like her that much. Bella’s right and bitchy comments (Sennott excels at Bitchy comments) give “Bunnylovr” a welcome middle ground, as do most of its comedies. Bella isn’t a total villain — that role is saved for callous Fuckboy Carter (Jack Kilmer). But she’s not a good person either, and the friction in their friendship is crucial in giving the speechless Rebecca some motivation as she spirals toward personal collapse.
Another source of drama is Rebecca’s absentee father William (Perry Yung), whom she reunites with after a long period of displacement after bumping into him on the street. William is a deadbeat dad with a gambling problem and a library of so-called VHS porn. But he’s an apologist and he tries to get to know Rebecca before it’s too late. She is more like her father than either of them would care to admit, and she withdraws from him when her feelings become too intense and confusing. The same goes for John, who seems like a decent enough guy—aside from the whole rabbit fetish thing, of course.
William has one redeeming quality: a black cat who keeps him company when his life decisions leave him alone in his trashy bachelor apartment. (Again, father and daughter are more alike than they think.) He loves the cat and shows Rebecca a picture of it on his phone. Rebecca looks and smiles politely. She doesn’t tell him about milk. These nuanced emotional beats are where “bunnylovr” shines.
Zhu places Rebecca and her story within the specific cross-cultural milieu of growing up Chinese-American in New York, where she can hang out with a gaggle of older Asian men betting Mahjong in the park and click rich kids stroking each other’s Egos at a art opening within a few minutes of each other. The dialogue is naturalistic, Charli XCX plays a little too loud on the soundtrack, and the camerawork is full of shaky hand-held close-ups—all predictable traits for a New York indie like this.
But while Zhu creates a world that feels empathetic and lived in, Rebecca as a character doesn’t give the viewer much to work with. She has no interests, no ambitions, no hobbies. Her apartment is plain white, with nothing on the walls.
She is so incompetent that the timeline drifts along with her; A major life event unfolds over what seems like months, only for another character to refer to their actions “last week.”
While the understated approach Zhu brings to her debut feature is authentic, it also underplays even a major, dramatic development in Rebecca’s life. The result is a little thing you can hold in the palm of your hand, soft and delicate and gentle.
Grade: B-
“Bunnylovr” premiered in 2025 Sundance Film festival. It is currently seeking US distribution.
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