An unnerving Lily James portrays the exploitative leader of an all-female cult in a well-paced, gripping psychological thriller, the womanly themes of which ring urgently true. Based on Nattiv’s own grandmother (alongside various cult survivors) and played by Carrie Coon with extraordinary emotional presence and pent-up energy privately looking for an outlet, Rita is an early-1980s woman leading an ordinary life in New Jersey. Quietly depressed, a wife to Reuben (Tracy Letts, Coon’s real-life partner) and mother to Ella (Bella Ramsey) and Jo (Odessa Young), Rita holds a monotonous desk job at a bank by day, and tends to her family by night as part of her humdrum routine.
Elsewhere, she agrees to be a part of a video project as a Holocaust survivor, an identity that has defined her past and continues to seep into her present in private, guilt-ridden ways. She is confronted with that question at her workplace by the mysterious Ricki (Lily James), an intriguing young woman with an uneasy edge looking to deposit a surprisingly hefty sum of money. Rita shrugs it off with a throwaway remark about her middle-aged metabolism, while handling Ricki’s business.
But Ricki isn’t talking about the weight women routinely pressure ourselves about. She’s played with a darkly enigmatic, unnerving quality by James in her finest work to date — a knowing, even domineering smile often curling around her lips. Her next question: “When was the last time you saw the sunset on a beach?” Ricki is a cult leader in plainest terms, setting her predatory sights on Rita as her next recruit.
As these cult stories tend to go, there is usually a magnetic male leader at the center, a sexual predator who brainwashes and preys on young women in search of direction. The scenario in “The Liberation” isn’t that at all — it actually feels several shades darker and more frightening than those clichés, as any middle-aged woman like this critic will feel in their bones. Rita is at a point in her life when she’s settled into what she deems a less-than-ideal reality, realizing there won’t be anything more.
She also feels like her body, her age and her reflection in the mirror are all collectively betraying her, another recognizable truth in her life. So what can possibly feel better and safer than the warm blanket that is female camaraderie, the allyship of fellow women who know exactly what Ricki is going through? Perhaps this is finally a chance for her to free herself from her past, from all society’s preconceived notions and expectations.
If only Ricki’s intentions were pure. Co-written by Noa Berman Herzberg, this is a deeply personal story for writer-director Nattiv, and he does unwavering justice to the shared universality of Rita’s womanly journey. Operating on two timelines that are edited with conviction and well-paced clarity by Sabine Hoffman and Yuval Orr, “The Liberation” introduces us to a Rita deeply caught in Ricki’s web at first, with her daughters Ella and Jo risking a long, perilous journey to rescue their mother from a commune somewhere in the woods.
Extract — continue reading at the source.
