Film Review: Saint Maud

With agony comes ecstasy, and with holiness comes a darkness. Rose Glass’s Saint Maud is the next big thing in a wave of so-called elevated horror, taking the exploitation and grind house tendencies of independent non-franchise horror of the 2000s, and giving them their own brand of high-art auteurism. It’s also the first of this emerging indie horror subgenre featuring the likes of Hereditary and The Lodge to truly function without feeling self-important.

Coastal British streets feel hellish in the grimey mist, even a tender romantic moment can feel like possession when that atmosphere contains the sinking dread and draining heat of judgement day. The street lamps grow leering, eyes of God watching, waiting, for some reason to grow beyond a voice in the back of Maud (Morfydd Clark)’s mind. Holy imagery is twisted, but what’s most important is this constant worship, devotion without relent go any fault.

Saint Maud leaps into the realm of the unexpected with how erotic it is. Fanaticism becomes fetishism, and the lines of devotion blur as the women create their ambiguous (and less subtle) bonds. “Nothing worthwhile comes easily”, and that’s also true for the slow burn here. Fear comes in the form of anxiety, when devotion wraps its hand so tightly that any deviance from these deeply held religious convictions feels like flames. Sainthood comes by defiance, but common holiness by obedience, and anything else, those hiring desires, or lapses of prayer, bring thoughts of hellfire.

It’s seemingly rare that a horror film centers upon mental health in a respectful way. Maud’s psychological disintegration is never used to villainize her, instead making the audience fear as her. We fear for the possession, the extent of her devotion, and for the interactions between Maud and Amanda (Jennifer Ehle), but never do we directly fear that the woman whose mental state is in decline is a cut and dry villain. It’s an empathetic gaze at one of horror’s greatest prejudices, that common trope of a woman driven mad.

Religion isn’t made out to be evil here, rather a compulsive desire, a conviction behind normality, bleeds into a movie monster in these women’s heads. It’s not about whether they will, but how far they will go. The spiral into madness is one tinged with ecstasy, and its these expressions that make the experience almost cathartic.

Morfydd Clark and Jennifer Ehle create a haunting chamber drama for much of the runtime, and it’s near-impossible to discuss the film without praising the scale of their towering performances. In the past year, Clark has been a name turning up in almost everything, from the new David Copperfield and Eternal Beauty to Crawl, seemingly out of nowhere, but deservingly so. She’s a powerhouse, and the physicality of her performance at the climax is graceful, yet should go down in the horror hall of fame for how genuinely scary it is.

Saint Maud has seen its release bounced around many times. I saw the film last April, and this review was originally set to publish in July, and it’s heard to keep track of how long the delay has continued. Now playing on Epic, it’s still worth seeking out even after the hype has died down, as Rose Glass has created a twisted take on religious ecstasy and the monstrous feminine that’s cult classic material. It’s a gorgeous hope film with emotional weight, and that’s what we all need as the genre-film giants continue to delay release. Like many A24-distributed titles, a long convoluted roll-out has led to the hype machine behind Saint Maud to slow before it’s accessible, but the film is more than worth seeking out even with the new slate of festival premieres finding release.