The film stars Nicole Kidman, Lauren Bacall, Cameron Bright, Danny Huston, Arliss Howard, Peter Stormare, Ted Levine, and Anne Heche.

Its plot follows a woman who becomes convinced that her deceased husband Sean is reincarnated as a ten-year-old boy.

Kidman was nominated for a Golden Globe Award for Best Actress in a Motion Picture – Drama for her performance.

At the beginning of the film, Sean is heard lecturing to an unseen audience, explaining that he does not believe in reincarnation.

When Clifford, Sean's brother, arrives at Anna's engagement party, his wife Clara excuses herself, saying she forgot to wrap a gift.

When Anna receives a letter from him the next day, warning her not to marry Joseph, she realizes the boy truly believes he is her reincarnated husband.

Anna hurries to Central Park and finds Sean waiting in the spot where her husband died.

This package was Clara's spiteful engagement gift, which the boy had secretly unearthed and read the night of the party.

Director Jonathan Glazer was interested in making a film about "the idea of eternal love" and a "mystery of the heart".

[3] The initial idea for the film came to him one day when he was in his kitchen: "There's this little kid and he tells a woman he's her dead husband – and he's ten years old.

To research for the role, Kidman spoke to two friends who had lost their fathers and they talked about how it still affected them years after.

[9] Birth premiered at the 61st Venice International Film Festival where its first press screening was greeted with widely reported booing[10] and catcalls.

The website's critics consensus reads, "A well-mounted production is undermined by a muddled, absurd storyline of questionable taste.

[13] Michael O'Sullivan, in his review for The Washington Post, wrote, "What I'm not so fond of is the cop-out ultimately taken by the filmmakers, who can't seem to follow through on their promisingly metaphysical premise (let alone the theme of obsessive love), electing instead to eliminate all ambiguity".

[14] In his review for the New York Daily News, Jack Mathews called the film, "corny, plodding, implausible and – on occasion – seriously creepy".

[15] However, Roger Ebert gave the film three-and-a-half stars out of four and compared it to Rosemary's Baby saying, "Birth is less sensational and more ominous, and also more intriguing because instead of going for quick thrills, it explores what might really happen if a 10-year-old turned up and said what Sean says".

[16] In his review for The New York Times, A. O. Scott praised Nicole Kidman's performance: "Without Ms. Kidman's brilliantly nuanced performance, Birth might feel arch, chilly and a little sadistic, but she gives herself so completely to the role that the film becomes both spellbinding and heartbreaking, a delicate chamber piece with the large, troubled heart of an opera.

"[24] Further controversy occurred at the festival when a journalist described Kidman as a "screen legend", to which her co-star Lauren Bacall replied, "She is a beginner".

[24] Complaints of the film's "cop-out" ending are questioned by Roger Ebert in his review, who notes: "There seem to be two possible explanations for what finally happens, but neither one is consistent with all of the facts.