Emily, 2022.
Directed by Frances O’Connor.
Starring Emma Mackey, Oliver Jackson-Cohen, Adrian Dunbar, Fionn Whitehead, and Alexandra Dowling.
SYNOPSIS:
Emily tells the imagined life of one of the world’s most famous authors, Emily Brontë.
The Brontë sisters and their works are internationally renowned with eldest Charlotte of course penning the classic Jane Eyre and her younger sister Emily penning the Gothic Wuthering Heights. Emily’s story is now told in a new biopic charting her life in the lead up to the writing and publication of Wuthering Heights and her death at the age of 30.
Emily is played by Sex Education’s Emma Mackey in one of her first front and centre roles in a prestige film, offering a glimpse at how her clear star talent translates to this stage. While it may play fast and loose with the facts of Emily’s life, this is a glimpse at a figure who history tells us very little about beyond her poetry and book as such it would be hard to make an entirely accurate film. Emily was a reclusive, nature loving individual and adding romantic interests livens the story.
First time writer and director Frances O’Connor has transitioned from starring in roles of this sort in the likes of Mansfield Park to helming her own period feature. For the most part it feels like the work of an accomplished director with plenty of competency on display and artistic flourishes to make this really stand out from other biopics of period dramas of its sort.
The film feels refreshing, making wonderful use of the Yorkshire landscape that was such an important part of Emily’s life and her work. Nanu Segal captures the rugged beauty of the landscape in both its sun drenched glory and rain drenched darkness. The use of the rain and frequent night time sequences brings a gothic, chilly quality that seems fitting of Brontë’s work and the period in question.
This is complemented wonderfully by Abel Korzeniowski’s brooding, baroque score that often leaves a haunting mark and helps the film navigate its transitions from an often very funny film to something more sombre and melancholic in its latter stages. It’s impressive for a first-time director to be able to balance the many elements of the film with such dexterity.
Emily acts as a complex portrayal of her mental state exploring her fragility and determinedness that shines across in her work and how she had to fight against societal expectations from the overbearing Patrick Brontë played with firmness and dry wit by Line Of Duty’s Adrian Dunbar. Alexandra Dowling’s Charlotte is a pantomime villain of sorts telling Emily to stop telling stories and living in a fantasy world with the village labelling her “the strange one” the friction between the pair works well with their waning relationship proving a key plot point.
If not entirely factual, there is romance between Emily and Oliver Jackson-Cohen’s Reverend William Weightman, a newcomer to the parish with whom Emily becomes infatuated. The chemistry between the pair is electrifying and really anchors the tragic undercurrent of the story. It’s the moments between the pair that help elevate their performances with a sense of longing and loss that cuts deep.
This offset by the more rebellious but no less important relationship of Emily and her brother Branwell (Fionn Whitehead) who formed a key part in Emily’s creative growth and interest in poetry and literature.
Emma Mackey really is a revelation here, a far cry from her role in Sex Education and showing a true versatility and star quality that mark her apart. She imbues Emily with an adventurous spirit but also sense of deep sadness and isolation and it is a joy to see her journey over the course of 2 hours wonderfully matched by Jackson-Cohen and Whitehead with smaller parts for Charlotte and Anne but both Dowling and Amelia Gething are up to the challenge.
Emily is a sumptuous, visually arresting film that acts as a wonderful showcase for its cast, especially Emma Mackey who is truly electrifying. The baroque, gothic overtones seem fitting of the subject matter and era with some creative visuals and story beats proving Frances O’Connor a director to be reckoned with who clearly knows how to make a period drama that stands out from a packed crowd.
Most of all though the film finds room for moments of warmth and humour amongst its sadness and melancholia, offering Emily Brontë the portrait she deserves.
Flickering Myth Rating – Film: ★ ★ ★ ★ / Movie: ★ ★ ★ ★
Chris Connor
