Life can be a game of Buckaroo; replace the mule with a human figure, and every item that is placed on your body represents stressful elements of life, so the plastic bucket can be an overly large credit card bill, the shovel a car accident etc, with more items finding a place on your body until you can’t take anymore and...

It’s a stressful game, and one that many can’t emotionally cope with.

Well if this particular game was adapted for the big screen, this film would be it.

Most people are used to having the odd bad day in life, but Linda (Rose Byrne) finds herself to be having more than her fair share of bad days: her young daughter is ill, having a tube in her stomach to help her eat; she is very busy at work as a psychotherapist, trying to make the lives of all her patients better; and a roof collapsed in her apartment, forcing her and her daughter to move into a motel until it’s fixed.

All this without the support of her husband, who’s away with work as he’s in the navy.

Linda soon finds herself turning to drugs and alcohol, in an attempt to self medicate, but with her situation not getting any better, she finds herself spiralling out of control.

Although this is only the second feature to be directed by Mary Bronstein, which she also wrote, it’s very much an A24 film, for better and worse.

Linda is constantly on the precipice of psychosis, and she has us standing precariously next to her; this feeling is amplified by Linda being in almost every single frame, often in an uncomfortable close-up that magnifies the emotional claustrophobia she’s experiencing – wherever she turns, there’s no escape.

There’s little in the way of relief – for her or for us – and is made worse by her daughter always appearing in abstract shots, never revealing her face, as if she may be a figment of both our warped imaginations.

It is an undeniable tour de force by Byrne, whose face is in constant close up is unavoidable, so every negative encounter she has is plastered all over her face for all the world to not only see, but feel.

Her Oscar nomination then was about as guaranteed a sure thing as you could get, but the fact the film wasn’t recognised in any other department, was also not a surprise.

Although the film has been describe by some as a comedy drama, its material doesn’t reflect that; it would be like describing Schindler’s List as the same, and expecting audiences to just go along with it.

The truth is if I Had Legs I’d Kick You is a brutal experience, akin to a cinematic slap across the face on an all too regular basis. Don’t be surprised if your fists clench on their own and your toes dig into your footwear, acting as your own coping mechanism watching it – and boy will you need one.

But if you can look at it objectively, it’s tantamount to a one woman show, and as powerful a performance Byrne gives, it detracts from the story surrounding her, to the point that it becomes more difficult to notice the longer the film goes on. This isn’t helped by the her endless close-ups, that not only isolate her from her reality, but also the audience, who witness that disconnect, and may well find it difficult to place her in one, adding to its often surreal quality.

Of course there’s a touch of irony in that a psychotherapist doesn’t have the ability to help themselves, but it just only reinforces the fact that we are all human.

Don’t be surprised if you exhale deeply as its end credits roll from sheer relief, and though you can walk away admiring it, it’s about as far from an entertaining experience as you can get.