Review: THE WONDER

We open not on the mud and turf of rural Ireland but a soundstage where the rear of box like sets are held in place by scaffolding. A woman's voice greets us and tells us we are about to see a film called The Wonder, sets the scene as Ireland within memory of the great famine, and bids us believe in the tale as the characters within it believe. Without a cut but a smooth track we glide into the first scene on a ship with a few drips coming through the slats and we softly forget that we are watching artifice.

Lib Wright, an English nurse, is travelling to Ireland to tend to a nine year old girl in a country house who has not eaten for months, claiming that she has been fed by manna from Heaven. While there is some skepticism in the community, her family and the local powers of medicine, church and state support the family's claim that the child is a wonder and on the tough avenue to sainthood. Lib hides her horror to tend to young Anna and explores means of getting to the truth, suspecting she might not like the look of what she finds.

This tale of troubled faith and frustrated rationalism does something interesting: bidding you join a dark and tirelessly solemn situation that seems progressively more hopeless and bringing you out the other end feeling that you've experienced more than a film. A beautifully rendered electronic score goes against any expectations that it might feel anachronistic by providing an emotive bed from the violent to the ethereal and eerie. Art direction and cinematography pluck every single scene from the canvases of 19th century paintings, some details like window frames actually do appear painted by masters. Details of reality to seal the period setting often othered by tidiness reminds us that the hems of ankle-length crinolines got muddy. More than authenticity, the interiors and landscapes transport us to the same conviction as the toy given to Anna by which a spinning disc creates the illusion of a bird being in or out of a cage. We choose to stay in, aiding and /or abetting the film itself.

But without good writing and casting this might collapse as a series of handsome tableaux. In the lead is Florence Pugh who gets cast for intelligence, bringing the years of military nursing to her character's young face, choosing when to show strength, when to mask it and when her sense of justice break through from sheer compulsion. Mother and daughter in real and screen life, Elaine Cassidy and Kila Lord Cassidy impress; the first burdened by the situation and the second creepily confident of its sanctity. Auld stagers Toby Jones, Ciaran Hinds deliver authority that we know is capable of injustice. Tom Burke's initial menace gives way to depth where we aren't expecting it. Everyone looks at home in a home that is less than a home.

While some might find it too slow, long or heavy, I'll recommend this as one to persist with. It won't get you laughing like your uncle at Christmas lunch but you might well end up rising from the table sated rather than bloated.