Saint Maud

Religious fervour and mental instability align provocatively in the discomfiting feature debut of writer/director Rose Glass. Set in an uninspiring British seaside town, the film follows palliative care nurse Maud (Morfydd Clark) as she embarks on a new assignment tending to a dying former dancer (Jennifer Ehle). The mouse-like Maud seizes the opportunity to apply her newfound Christian zeal to the situation, taking it upon herself to save her patient's soul. The confrontational relationship between an easily appalled, intensely alienated carer and her bitter and stubbornly scandalous siren of a patient is fascinating, and it's a shame there's not more time for it to be explored. Still, Saint Maud is blazing, spiralling stuff, announcing its director in ferocious style, with a scenario that's apocalyptically rendered by cinematographer Ben Fordesman, while its tortured protagonist is brought to vivid life by a sensationally committed Clark. It all amounts to a film that will stay with you; whether you want it to or not.