I’m not really sure why I didn’t go to see Saint Maud at the cinema. The trailer grabbed me, reviews were very positive, and it came out at the right time of year for me to be in a particularly spooky mood. Yet, I missed it. But worry not because the fantastic institution that is Channel 4 recently put the film on the All4 service, completely free! Fantastic I thought, just in time for Halloween. So, I did just that, watched it at the spookiest time of the year and yet here I am now both ecstatic that the film was indeed great, but confused at the complete lack of spooks. Was I misled by the trailer? But more importantly, does it really matter?
Palliative care nurse and devout Roman Catholic Christian, Maud (Morfydd Clark), has been placed in charge of caring for the terminally ill former dancer and choreographer Amanda (Jennifer Ehle). Appalled by Amanda’s hedonistic lifestyle, Maud makes it her mission to save Amanda’s soul by any means necessary before her demise.
I got the impression from the trailer of Saint Maud that this would be a run of the mill possession story, with the hook of it being that this was a shoestring budget British film rather than some Hollywood affair in the vein of The Conjuring. But I couldn’t have been more wrong. Saint Maud is so unnerving without ever making it explicit as to what’s actually happening. Maud clearly believes she is being contacted by God, that she has been chosen to do extraordinary work for him. But whether this is true, whether she is in fact being manipulated by a demonic presence, or whether she is actually just crazy is left entirely open to interpretation. The whole film has this eerie yet ethereal quality to it, and having it be set in an indistinct British seaside town gives it a feeling of being on the edge of total oblivion (believe me, I grew up in one, it really does feel like you’re at the end of the world). Combine this with the incredibly repetitive shots that become progressively more disturbing each time they happen and watching Saint Maud feels like some kind of ritual. It’s engrossing, it’s overpowering at times, and yet it’s also incredibly restrained. Save for the opening and closing shots of the film which are hauntingly graphic, the film leans so much more on just making you feel isolated and uncomfortable rather than showing you anything explicitly horrific.
Palliative care nurse and devout Roman Catholic Christian, Maud (Morfydd Clark), has been placed in charge of caring for the terminally ill former dancer and choreographer Amanda (Jennifer Ehle). Appalled by Amanda’s hedonistic lifestyle, Maud makes it her mission to save Amanda’s soul by any means necessary before her demise.
I got the impression from the trailer of Saint Maud that this would be a run of the mill possession story, with the hook of it being that this was a shoestring budget British film rather than some Hollywood affair in the vein of The Conjuring. But I couldn’t have been more wrong. Saint Maud is so unnerving without ever making it explicit as to what’s actually happening. Maud clearly believes she is being contacted by God, that she has been chosen to do extraordinary work for him. But whether this is true, whether she is in fact being manipulated by a demonic presence, or whether she is actually just crazy is left entirely open to interpretation. The whole film has this eerie yet ethereal quality to it, and having it be set in an indistinct British seaside town gives it a feeling of being on the edge of total oblivion (believe me, I grew up in one, it really does feel like you’re at the end of the world). Combine this with the incredibly repetitive shots that become progressively more disturbing each time they happen and watching Saint Maud feels like some kind of ritual. It’s engrossing, it’s overpowering at times, and yet it’s also incredibly restrained. Save for the opening and closing shots of the film which are hauntingly graphic, the film leans so much more on just making you feel isolated and uncomfortable rather than showing you anything explicitly horrific.
What makes everything mesh together so well with Saint Maud are the fantastic performances from Clark & Ehle. Clark is just so sincere with this performance, all the time, and it’s so easy to believe that she really is this Maud character. Her performance is able to shift from caring to sinister without you even realising it, and that’s really quite frightening how close she manages to toe the line between someone you trust and someone who’s dangerous.
As for Ehle, she gives Amanda so much depth without doing very much. Subtle physical cues help you distinguish between whether she’s being truthful or deceptive, and all of it is done to play mind games with Maud. As Maud’s mission intensifies and Amanda claims to have spiritual experiences alongside Maud, it’s difficult to tell whether she genuinely does believe in this higher power, or whether she’s making fun of the situation to hurt Maud.
Whilst Saint Maud certainly wasn’t what I was expecting, I had a really great time with it. The performances were excellent, and I think I preferred the subtlety of everything over jump scare possession nonsense which I was expecting. It’s a rare religious horror that doesn’t objectively villainise the church, but the way in which it criticises religion and the power it has over people is considerably more nuanced. Not bad for a first time director, Rose Glass is certainly one to watch.
As for Ehle, she gives Amanda so much depth without doing very much. Subtle physical cues help you distinguish between whether she’s being truthful or deceptive, and all of it is done to play mind games with Maud. As Maud’s mission intensifies and Amanda claims to have spiritual experiences alongside Maud, it’s difficult to tell whether she genuinely does believe in this higher power, or whether she’s making fun of the situation to hurt Maud.
Whilst Saint Maud certainly wasn’t what I was expecting, I had a really great time with it. The performances were excellent, and I think I preferred the subtlety of everything over jump scare possession nonsense which I was expecting. It’s a rare religious horror that doesn’t objectively villainise the church, but the way in which it criticises religion and the power it has over people is considerably more nuanced. Not bad for a first time director, Rose Glass is certainly one to watch.