Viewers familiar with the recent work of filmmaker Joanna Hogg will recognize early on in her latest film, The Eternal Daughter, that it’s a stealth sequel, or rather continuation, to her two prior films: The Souvenir and The Souvenir Part II. Those films were autobiographical works that chronicled Hogg’s relationship with, and subsequent grief for, a drug-addicted man she dated who later died of an overdose. Above all, they were movies about being movies, which self-consciously utilized the artifice of the medium to comment on how we use the camera to capture and recreate our greatest desires and fears. While entirely fictional, The Eternal Daughter does something thematically similar, repurposing the same characters while transplanting them into something resembling a Gothic ghost story.
A24 has loosely and somewhat dishonestly marketed The Eternal Daughter as a horror film. There’s hardly a scare to be found outside of the existential variety, though there is plenty of atmosphere. The rich 16mm cinematography, in natural 4:3, recalls the framing and atmosphere of Alfred Hitchcock’s Rebecca, The Uninvited or any number of classic Gothic horror films. The score, as well, recalls classic cinema, with its emphasis on dramatic strings and melodrama. Hogg is clearly having fun with this overt stylization and creates some indelible images within the foggy, mist cloaked trees and old manor where her deliberately stripped-back story takes place.
“Stripped-back” is the operative term. There are only four actors in the film, and two of them are Tilda Swinton. There’s also a very cute dog named Louis. Swinton plays The Souvenir’s Julie, now middle-aged, as well as Julie’s elderly mother, Rosalind (a role she originated in the two prior films). The majority of the story is a two-hander between Julie and Rosalind as they take an unspecified holiday at a wooded manor, Rosalind’s childhood home, that’s now been converted into a hotel. They appear to be the only guests, outside of a grumpy receptionist who leaves in the evening and an old, widowed groundskeeper. Julie is a filmmaker, attempting to frame a new project around her mother’s past, and surreptitiously records their conversations in the empty restaurant where they eat every night. She also goes on nighttime walks with Louis, where she encounters strange bumps in the night and a repeated ghostly presence.
So little happens on the surface of The Eternal Daughter that it may be tempting to say it’s a film about nothing. In fact, it’s so humorously uneventful that it actually adds to the experience, with the mundanity taking on a distinct charm that allows for small moments to breathe with considerable life. Much of this is due to Swinton’s incredible dual performance, which never once calls attention to itself despite the fact that the characters never even share a frame. The illusion is terrific because it’s so simple, and because Hogg allows her lead’s chameleon-like talent to lead the way rather than overselling it with visual gimmicks. The small interactions shine through as well, especially the repeated encounters between Julie and the receptionist (Carly-Sophia Davies), who is also the waitress in the hotel restaurant (it’s never established who, if anyone else, cooks the food).
The effect of Hogg’s visual choices is a story that seems to exist out of time. Only occasionally are we reminded that what we’re watching takes place in the modern day. At several points, Julie watches the receptionist leave for the night, presumably picked up by her partner, who plays loud hip hop music as they drive away. It’s an anachronistic pairing of sound and image, that seems to disrupt Julie’s desire to escape into the world of the past.
Of course, all this does add up to something quite haunting and moving. It’s a film about aging, about coming to terms with death and what you choose to remember about the people you’ve lost. It may not be much of a horror film, but it is a ghost story, and the phantoms haunting Julie are very real – just not in the obvious way you’d expect. Similar to The Souvenir, there’s a deceptive amount of depth hiding beneath what appears to be a scant story, including an incredible climactic sequence, but unlike those films, it doesn’t have the same emotional impact or staying power.
The Eternal Daughter is a minor work by a major filmmaker, in many ways an epilogue to a pair of highly personal and superior masterworks. Nevertheless, it’s the effort of an immensely talented pair of creatives who can’t really put a foot wrong, who understand that individual pieces of cinema don’t always need to be a complete work, instead coming together to form the tapestry of the whole.
Photo courtesy of A24
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