Florida's Film, Television and the Arts Magazine
Mother Mary
What happens when a superstar celebrity becomes an acolyte to her own status? What happens when she loses touch with her own humanity, alienating herself from the one who loved her? When you have the world at your feet, will that power, that fame, the mythology you created, bring you joy?
Mother Mary, starring Anne Hathaway as Mary, and Michaela Coel as Sam, her former love interest, drapes itself in gorgeous clothing, mysticism and a great deal of religious iconography. Sam was not only her partner in life, she was Mary’s clothing designer for all of her tours. They made each other famous. But Mary, when she decided to rework her current life, left no place in the new one for Sam.
It may have been unintentional on her part, but you can’t tell someone not to feel rejected. Mary’s rejection of Sam stung.
And now, after years apart, Mary is back, wanting Sam to create a new look for her new show.
The two women spend the entire film verbally fencing, taking the measure of each other in the castle-like fortress in which Sam lives and works. We get a glimpse of a scar on Mary’s back that runs from her neck to her tailbone. So you know there’s a story to be revealed. Sam wants no part in of Mary’s demands as she has a runway show coming up. It’s obvious that she hates Mary for what Mary did to their relationship.
When Sam eventually starts to sketch, the designs are as viscerally violent as the emotions the two unleash at each other in the studio. We get ghost stories, dream sequences, fortune telling, mystic circles, bizarre silent dancing. Without accompanying music, the dance resembles demonic possession. Mother Mary is an uncomfortable movie to watch; you’re always filled with the suspicion that these characters are conning each other, even as the credits roll.
