In the near future, Mia (Elizabeth Olsen) and Aaryan (Himesh Patel) are living very well. While the rest of the world is ravaged by climate change and disease, they are among the lucky and prosperous 0.01 percent. They live in a spacious, impeccably designed home, are satisfied with their work, and have a solid marriage. They lack only one thing: a child. Because of limited space and resources, the government regulates who can have children and how many. An assessor is sent to determine whether a couple is worthy of raising a child (which is incubated and delivered outside the womb). Assessors stay for a week, observing the couple before reaching a verdict.

In this case, the assessor is Virginia (Alicia Vikander), a plain woman dressed as if she plucked her clothes from a sales rack in The Handmaid’s Tale. Initially, she is in the couple’s face at every moment—including intimate ones—stating, “Act like I’m not here.” However, on the second morning, Virginia begins behaving like a three-year-old—the most infuriating three-year-old imaginable. She flicks food into Aaryan’s eye, refuses to come inside during a driving rainstorm, crawls under the table and kicks it during a dinner party, and even urinates on a guest, among other things. Mia and Aaryan, desperate for their chance to become parents, assume this is part of the evaluation and begin treating Virginia as their child.

This is the film’s strongest section, as their potential parenting styles clash. The script plays its best hand when these moments slip into satire, as the couple’s bougie impulses are overwhelmed by the chaos Virginia unleashes. However, this section drags on too long, yielding diminishing returns—though every parent will chuckle in recognition when the couple has 12 hours to assemble an impossibly complex child’s play tent. Virginia is, simply put, a brat and an unrealistic depiction of a child. Most sane prospective parents would tap out after a day of this. These two endure it for a week.

World-building in sci-fi is tough. It’s hard to get the details right or even determine which details matter in making the world feel consistent and believable. It also depends on the type of sci-fi film you’re making. In escapist movies like The Gorge, nerds like me will let inconsistencies slide because, hey, nerds like to have fun too. But if you’re tackling serious themes, we expect cohesion, and The Assessment doesn’t pass that test.

We are led to believe that only a select few wealthy families have the opportunity to become parents because resources in the habitable zones are so limited. Then, at a dinner party, one guest casually mentions that she is 150 years old. It turns out that every inhabitant—or at least the well-off—takes a daily supplement that prolongs life. So if they can do that, why not not do that, let people die naturally, and allow more children to be born? Also, all animals have been culled. Aaryan’s job is to develop virtual pets that can exist in the real world. Okay, but why were the animals culled? Disease? Overpopulation? Resource scarcity?

A recent, better film, After Yang, explored similar themes with the same arty vibe and near-future setting, but it benefitted from excellent world-building and thoughtful execution. Most importantly, it felt like a story set in a fully realized world, rather than a world awkwardly constructed to fit a story. It was simply more organic.

That’s not to say The Assessment lacks its charms. The acting is superb. Vikander is a chameleon, fully inhabiting a complex, nearly impossible role. Olsen matches her as the fiercely intelligent, sharp-edged Mia, who fears she may inherit her own mother’s emotional distance. And Patel acquits himself well, despite having an underwritten part. When the filmmakers satirically skewer these characters, they succeed. But when they attempt to dig deeper, The Assessment gets lost in the weeds.