Review: The Beguiled

To beguile is to deceive or divert and The Beguiled, directed by Sofia Coppola from Thomas C. Pullman's 1966 novel and Don Siegel's 1971 film adaptation, certainly beguiles one with its delicacy, decorum and gentility. Yet its atmospheric lushness, soundtrack of cricket song and whispering winds, and the rustling of the angelically coloured costumes belie the horror to come. Whilst less lurid than Siegel's version, Coppola's deceptively dainty rendering is still very much a southern melodrama at heart.

The film begins in the woods, as most fairy tales do, when young Amy (Oona Laurence) comes upon a wounded soldier by the name of Colonel John McBurney (Colin Farrell). It is 1864, three years into the Civil War, and already his presence signals danger for he is a Union deserter. Amy, curious and considerate, decides to bring him to her school, Miss Farnsworth's Seminary for Young Ladies, which has been abandoned save for its headmistress Martha (Nicole Kidman), spinster teacher Edwina (Kirsten Dunst), and four other students Alicia (Elle Fanning), Jane (Angourie Rice), Emily (Emma Howard), and Marie (Addison Riecke). The septet have been whiling away their time sewing and embroidering, conjugating French verbs, running the household, and saying evening prayers so it's no surprise that his presence immediately has each of them bewitched, bothered and bewildered.

McBurney, who has no wish to be handed over as a prisoner of war to the Confederate Army, deploys his Irish charm with Martha, Edwina and Alicia particularly affected. Alicia is the oldest of all the students, and clearly has no compunction about conveying her interest in the soldier, even sneaking into his room and waking him with a kiss. Martha, who initially reminds him that he is a most unwelcome visitor that they are merely practicing Christian charity by nursing him back to health, is swayed by his courtliness and his empathy for everything she's had to do to survive the war. However, most dangerously disarmed is Edwina, who believes McBurney's declarations of love and hopes that he will be the white knight to take her out of the seminary that has served as both prison and sanctuary. The jostling for his affection is played out in a marvellous dinner scene that finds all of the belles dressed in their finery, trading demure but barbed insults and, most tellingly and amusingly, discussing who is most responsible for the apple pie that McBurney compliments.

Coppola won the Best Director prize at this year's Cannes Film Festival, making her only the second woman to do so in the festival's history (the first was Yuliya Solntseva for The Chronicle of Flaming Years in 1961). The jury's decision might seem generous at first glance since there isn't necessarily anything in The Beguiled that she hasn't already done in her previous films. Yet the subtlety, intelligence and power of her direction accumulates. The way she establishes the elements that will soon take on greater significance - the Confederate Army patrol, Martha's revolver, the mushrooms, Edwina's pin - or her compositions of the women, whether gathered in prayer or around a piano, that may convey differing individual intentions but are underlined by a collective mindset. There's a tenseness and terseness, a very clear sense of purpose, and a rationality that renders the more extreme moments of the film all the more chilling.

The technical contributions are unsurprisingly excellent, from Stacey Battat's costumes which come to resemble gossamer armour to Philippe Le Sourd's painterly and evocative lensing of the candlelit interiors and the sunlit exteriors. Above all else, The Beguiled is about the moments where faces express everything: the hopeful blush that pierces through the melancholy mask of Dunst's visage, the flashing fury in Farrell's eyes as McBurney drops all seductive pretence and, most of all, the absolute steel that Kidman embodies as the woman may preach compassion but isn't above getting blood on her hands whether by vengeance or necessity.

The Beguiled

Directed by: Sofia Coppola

Written by: Sofia Coppola; based on the novel by Thomas C. Pullman and the screenplay by Albert Maltz and Irene Kamp

Starring: Colin Farrell, Nicole Kidman, Kirsten Dunst, Elle Fanning, Oona Laurence, Angourie Rice, Addison Riecke, Emma Howard