Anchoress

Anchoress

Nobody, unless he is a very saint, acts without some degree of self-aggrandizement. Chris Newby’s “Anchoress” takes up that idea in its Middle Ages setting, telling the story of a young woman who chooses to be walled up for life. As she sets the final stone and seals it with mortar, she has an expression of perfect happiness on her face; if that may be sanctity, it is also the look of a teenager who has at last escaped from under her parents’ thumbs.

Christine (Natalie Morse) lives in a hovel on a barren landscape in medieval times where she and her sister and parents are indentured to the warty reeve who administers the lands they work. He wants to marry her; her parents are willing; she wants no part, and one day alone with the statue of the virgin in the rude local church, she feels peace.

Soon she and her sister are bringing offerings to the virgin apples that would cripple the reeve to lose and with a little judicious encouragement by the local priest (who knows that an anchoress will enhance his church), Christine is begging to spend all her days inside a stone cell attached to the church walls, where she will be able to see the face of the virgin through one small window and talk to visitors through another. There will be no door.

The bishop comes to crossexamine her and is impressed by her simple faith. Her mother Christian tinged with witchcraft takes another view: “You won’t feel my backhand there girl but what about fire?” Life as an anchoress beats being a poor medieval serf. The devout bring Christine soup and bread, and at first she loves watching sunlight inch across floor of cell while glimpsing birds/trees/sky out small outside window. Imprisoned or not, “the body shall be wherever the soul desires in an instant,” said the priest, although since Christine cannot read and has never gone anywhere, she can only easily imagine where she is.

Because she has walled herself up, she is assumed to be holy, and people come with their problems, seeking advice. She tries to give it but eventually the ordeal begins to grow on her. The cell is cold and damp and the problems begin to wear her down. “They’re burying my daughter them that couldn’t dig up a turnip if they tried,” her mother complains bitterly. But soon enough the mother is in trouble for her witchcraft and abortions.

“Anchoress” was filmed in a cold monochrome, more silver and white than black and white, and sometimes it looks like one of Ingmar Bergman’s medieval stories. The story is quiet, slow and bleak with a mesmerizing power. Morse carries much of the weight as Christine; her reliable open face radiates simplicity, faith and enormous naiveté too. Though the film is set centuries ago, Christine could be any number of today’s children who would do almost anything to get away from home; it’s that simple human truth beneath the spiritual trappings that gives “Anchoress” its power.

Playing through Thursday at the Music Box Theatre, the film has two messages: (1) Religion can be a great comfort in hard times, and (2) Be careful what you wish for because you may receive it.

Watch Anchoress For Free On Gomovies.