Movie Review: Novitiate

Novitiate **** / *****

Directed by: Margaret Betts.

Written by: Margaret Betts   

Starring: Margaret Qualley (Sister Cathleen), Melissa Leo (Reverend Mother), Dianna Agron (Sister Mary Grace), Morgan Saylor (Sister Evelyn), Julianne Nicholson (Nora Harris), Liana Liberato (Sister Emily), Denis O'Hare (Archbishop McCarthy), Maddie Hasson (Sister Sissy), Ashley Bell (Sister Margaret), Marco St. John (Father Luca), Sasha Mason (Cathleen, age 12), Eliza Mason (Cathleen, age 7).

 

There’s some much going on in Margaret Betts’ debut film Novitiate, it’s a minor miracle that she keeps it all on track. The film is set in the 1960s, during the Vatican II meetings, and takes place at a convent run with an iron fist by the Reverend Mother (Melissa Leo) – who has not left its grounds in 40 years. Vatican II will bring sweeping changes to the Catholic Church – and to the role of nuns within the Church, and the Reverend Mother is not happy about it. For many movies, that would likely be more than enough to base a movie around – and yet here, it’s the secondary subplot.

 

The movie is really about the group of young women – all in their late teens – who arrive at the convent, determined to become nuns. The process will take them two years – and they all start off eager – but not all of them will last. The movie’s main character is Cathleen (Margaret Qualley) – who discovers Catholicism when her mother (Julianne Nicholson – continuing to make her case as one of the best character actresses working today) sends her to an all-girls Catholic school – because she can do so for free. Her husband has just left, and she’s now a single mother – and far from perfect, even if she loves her daughter. When Cathleen announces her intention to become a nun, her mother is dumbfounded (she is an atheist after all) and thinks she’s throwing her life away. But Cathleen is in love she says – in love with God.

 

The movie is really about that deeply confusing love that Cathleen – and the other young women – feel for God. Do they love God, or are they in love with God – and if they are going to “marry” him – does it matter which one it is? The young women are all devote – but none of them are certain either. And what happens when their sexuality starts to emerge – and feelings of lust overtake them – either for men or boys they used to know (or know in their minds) or for each other. The movie explores this – but not in an exploitive way. This isn’t a nuns gone wild exploitation film – but one that asks the questions in ways that I think open minded religious people can relate to.

 

As a director Betts is remarkably restrained for the most part. She perfectly case Qualley in the lead role – because Qualley has one of those wide, open, deeply expressive faces, in which so much can be read into while she does so little. Qualley, who didn’t do so well in Death Note earlier this year, deserves for this to be a breakout role for her. On the other end of the scale is Melissa Leo – who goes at times wildly (and wildly entertainly) over-the-top as the Reverend Mother. She can be cruel and vicious when she senses weakness, she pounces, and can destroy the young nuns in minutes. Yet, even she becomes more than just a caricature as the film moves along – you cannot blame her for being put out by Vatican II – which, after all, completely undermines what she has dedicated her life to. When she complains to the local Arch Bishop that the sisters “weren’t even given a voice” in the Vatican II meetings, he coldly explains “That’s not how this works”. The Reverend Mother is on one hand a monster – and another, a victim.

 

That Betts keeps both of these plots going through the film is deserving of high praise – especially since this is her debut film. It’s as an assured debut as you will see this year – and a complex film, that asks difficult questions, and comes to difficult conclusions.