There are many ways to make a biopic. Emulating something that defined a person’s life can be a creative way to add some flavor and personality that’s reminiscent of the person themselves. It’s hard to find a film that chooses as fitting and unusual a way to present its narrative as The Testament of Ann Lee, which incorporates musical numbers inspired by spiritual songs from the Shaker faith for its profile of its influential founder and the passion with which she sought to establish something lasting that she believed could save people’s souls.
Ann (Amanda Seyfried) grows up in the eighteen century with a negative view of sex, seeking a religion that feels meaningful to her. The right place becomes apparent when she attends a prayer service of the Shakers, known for their dramatic movements. She soon becomes a leader and prophet, decreeing that, in a vision, she learned that avoiding sex is the true path to salvation. Encountering resistance from other clergy members and the intolerant law, Ann sees promise in America and the religious freedom it promises and sets off with her followers to establish a colony in New York, where they will work to expand their flock and bring more people into the fold.
The Shakers, whose membership is now in the single digits largely because they don’t bear children, are a breakaway movement sometimes called “Shaking Quakers,” and despite the immediate interest director Mona Fastvold had when she first head a Shaker hymn, it seems that she’s the first to want to make a film about them. This isn’t just a look at their early leader but rather a musical interpretation of the way in which they pray. The film’s credits note that the music is inspired by the religion’s spirituals, and it’s a mesmerizing way to get to know the passion of these people that might otherwise have seen foreign and inaccessible. Making this a musical enables it to seem more real, which isn’t always the case but works marvelously here.
Fastvold is fresh off her first Oscar nomination for her work on the screenplay for The Brutalist, which also screened at the Toronto International Film Festival. She and her work and life partner Brady Corbet switch roles for this film, with Corbet collaborating on the screenplay with her while she directs. It’s a bold vision that she’s able to realize fully, introducing Ann as a child and following her as she becomes more devout and eager to spread her faith as widely as possible. It doesn’t paint her as a saint but as someone who believes she has a true purpose in life, and this film absolutely succeeds in conveying her spirit and iron will which push her to stay the course even when circumstances are truly dire and those around her are losing hope.
Seyfried, who earned an Oscar nomination for Mank and won an Emmy for The Dropout, has steadily been building to more serious roles, and this is her most impressive performance yet. She captures the unmatchable energy that Ann has and the way in which she views herself as a conduit to God, not a prophet to be worshipped but a messenger with the power to speak truth. It’s a fully involved turn that is almost certain to lead to another Oscar nomination. Lewis Pullman, Thomasin McKenzie, and Christopher Abbott lead a supporting cast that powerfully shows differing degrees of fidelity and servitude.
Just as Seyfried’s performance defines this engrossing period epic, so too does the music. Daniel Blumberg, an Oscar winner for his score for The Brutalist, has collected and composed a hypnotic soundtrack featuring what are technically musical numbers but which all feel so organic that they almost don’t take the audience out of the story at all, beautiful and haunting. Ann is a formidable protagonist in her own right, but the technical elements employed by Fastvold and her creative collaborators enhance this film, making it a moving, captive experience where this very physical declaration of faith doesn’t feel abnormal or uncomfortable. The Testament of Ann Lee is a strikingly inventive take on the biopic that brings its subject’s legacy to life in an extraordinary and unparalleled way.
Movie Rating: 9/10
