God's Creatures
A mother's loyalties are tested in Irish drama God's Creatures, staring Emily Watson and Paul Mescal
What would you do to protect your family? That’s the uncomfortable question at the heart of God’s Creatures, a film that highlights the communal bonds that allow sexual predators to escape the consequences of their actions.
Aileen (Emily Watson) is a shift manager at a seafood processing plant in a small Irish village. She is delighted when her prodigal son, Brian (Paul Mescal), returns from Australia, but her joy proves short-lived when Brian is accused of raping one of her colleagues. When she's asked to provide him an alibi, she finds herself lying to protect him.
It’s a morally reprehensible thing to do by any standard, but the moment of untruth, when it comes, is played so subtly by Watson that it would be easy to miss. It’s less of a deliberate choice than the instinct of a mother who feels her child is in danger. Placing the audience in the interrogation room with Aileen, it becomes easier to understand why she’d make such a snap decision in the heat of the moment, even as the consequences of her actions become increasingly clear.
Directors Saela Davis and Anna Rose Holmer skilfully capture the insularity of a small Irish fishing village. It is a delicate ecosystem, one in which any disturbance must be quickly dealt with. As a result, the victim, Sarah, finds herself excluded from the community and is refused service at the only pub in town while her attacker shares drinks and jokes with the landlord.
Thanks to his perfect portrayal of a father struggling with depression in last year's Aftersun, Mescal has become the It boy of indie cinema, and God’s Creatures will only further his already burgeoning reputation. From the moment he wanders into a pub during the middle of a wake, a twinkle in his smile and a grin on his face, it’s clear that Brian is the light of his mother’s life. Yet Mescal never flinches from the character's darker, sleazier side. He’s a restless soul, trapped in a claustrophobic community and unwilling to clarify what made him leave Australia and return to Ireland. Though the script deliberately doesn’t state what Brian has done, his guilt is never in doubt.
The ending, when it comes, feels bleakly inevitable, so perfectly has it been foreshadowed by Shane Crowley’s script. Though most of the film explores the complexities of being close to someone who is accused of rape, Davis and Holmer are smart enough to centre the final moments on Sarah, giving her a voice denied by both the law and her fellow villagers.
God’s Creatures resists the urge to provide any kind of easy answer. There are no monologues full of righteous anger, no cathartic court scenes, and little hope for systemic change. If there is a message, it’s that when it comes to deeply personal cases such as this, sacrifices have to be made for there to be any hope of justice.
Released 31 Mar by BFI; certificate 15
Screening at Glasgow Film Festival, 2-3 Mar