Sainte Maude

There are essentially two ways to read 'Saint Maud (2019)', though its final half-second pretty much tells you exactly which reading is preferred - intended, even - by its writer/director, and it constantly keeps you flittering back and forth between these readings until its final few frames (literally). A film focusing on a deeply religious character is always going to be controversial, even if it doesn't depict her doing fanatical and dangerous things, but I don't think that the picture is condemning religion itself. In fact, I don't think it's 'about' religion at all. Instead, it's about loneliness. Maud is a deeply flawed protagonist, spiralling further and further into her own personal delusions as she exhibits increasingly harmful behaviour. However, it's typically easy to empathise with her, without condoning her actions. The movie starts off more or less as a straight drama, seeing our lead take on a new position as an at-home nurse for an ex-dancer with late-stage leukaemia. There are levels of enigmatic dread running through this segment of the film, mainly thanks to the director's willingness to slow things down and gnaw away at the audience, but things don't really slip into proper horror territory until around halfway through. Even then, the horror is mostly subtle. There are some elements of wince-inducing body-horror but most of the scary stuff is psychological. It becomes increasingly clear just how entrenched we are within Maud's perspective, as we begin to get glimpses of the way she sees the world, and it's never clear what's actually 'real'. This keeps you on your toes until the thing reaches its somewhat surprising yet simultaneously inevitable conclusion. For the most part, the affair walks the line between supernatural and psychological with poise. There are only a couple of moments in which it wobbles, with one sequence in particular feeling as though it crosses that line a little, but they aren't all that bothersome once you've cemented your final reading of the narrative (which, again, will either be confirmed or entirely upended by the last half-second). It's a really interesting, engaging and effective experience overall. It's also achingly well-made, with some phenomenal cinematography and brilliantly low-key performances. It's distinct, it's disturbing and it sticks with you. 8/10.

....but almost worth the wait. But the one thing this isn't is a horror film, its a psychological thriller at best. Well worth a watch but I'd hardly call it a masterpiece.

This is one of those movies where a couple of critics overdo their reviews and all the others feel they have to do the same or they will look dumb. So it gets overhyped. What happens here is a perfectly decent movie gets so hyped you are always going to be disappointed because it cannot possibly live up to that hyped reviewers drivel. Its a smart, clever movie that takes a while to get going, has a lot of padding and is not in any way a real horror film. It most certainly isnt "the scariest film of the decade" or whever that nonsense said. The lead is very good as is almost all the cast - pointless as some of them were. I liked the ending, thoiugh it was a little predictable. As an exploration of religious fervour in the wrong mind and the damage that can do, it certainly succeeds but if you are expecting the exorcist or anything like it, you will be disappointed. This is yet another example of critics trying to show how clever they are and at the same time, causing the movie to disappoint movie goers who, had they ignored those critics would probably have said, yeah, that was pretty good that - which is pretty much all it is. Scarborough is gorgeous as always though. if you've nebver been you should, quintessential English holiday spot.

An uptight religious nurse becomes the caregiver of a cancer-striken dancer and tries to save her soul in the most disturbing of ways.

Saint Maud is what happens when you take all the hallmarks of an A24 movie and shove them into a blender. The result is somewhat interesting, but will leave a bitter taste in your mouth. It's definitely not a film to watch if you're already feeling under the weather or depressed, because it might very well send you over the edge. The ending seems almost telegraphed from the start. You know nothing is going to end well for any of these sad people.

How much you enjoy Saint Maud will depend on how high your tolerance for somber and depressing psychodramas is. It's certainly well shot and has a great central performance by Morfydd Clark to recommend it.

"Saint Maud" follows the titular Maud, a young hospice nurse in a small, dreary English seaside village who takes a job caring for Amanda, a cancer-stricken, middle-aged American dancer and bon vivant living in a secluded mansion on the hillside. Maud, a recent Catholic convert prone to her own bizarre visions, comes to believe that caring for the dying Amanda is her mission and purpose--a soul to save. But at what price?

This insular and occasionally shocking feature debut by director Rose Glass is, though marketed as a horror film, really more a psychological examination of abject loneliness and descent into madness. In some ways, it feels like it could have been written first as a novel, and that's part of what makes the film unique. The film's largest achievement is that it successfully operates on a number of levels, functioning as a meditation on loneliness, a portrait of a nervous breakdown, a hagiographic tragedy, as well as (possibly) a demonic possession story.

Ultimately, at its base level, "Saint Maud" is a character study reflected between the two dichotomous central characters: Maud, the lonely, psychologically-fragile nurse obsessed with matters of the spirit; and Amanda, a woman who has lived for the pleasures of the flesh (the fact that she was a dancer, a profession strongly appertained with the physical body, is no symbolic coincidence). Their philosophical clashing of perspectives ultimately shatters Maud, though she manages to rebuild her absolution in a terrifying way. Both characters are delicately portrayed by Morfydd Clark and Jennifer Ehle, respectively, and the film would not work without the strength they bring to each.

All in all, this film is a dour portrait of both mental decline and spiritual ecstasy, depending on how one wants to look at it. Glass puts forth her own take in the film's final frame, which almost veers too far into hokey territory, but in the end, "Saint Maud" manages to be a potent (and depressing) examination of one person's tragic search for purpose. 8/10.