One of the things I love about covering indie fests is the ‘not knowing’. Walking into a film and having zero expectations, from the director, the stars, the IP — only a few sentences to go on, which is what landed me in Abigail Before Beatrice at the Chattanooga Film Festival.
The sophomore effort by Cassie Keet promised:
“An isolated woman is confronted by her past when a fellow former cult member reaches out with news that their leader has been released from prison early. What happens when your search for love and acceptance leads you to a toxic relationship? How do you move on when you can’t let go?”
As a fan of anything cult, be it doc, Netflix series or film, I was in the bag easy for this. But this film is so much more than its synopsis, because it sidesteps the more exploitive sordid trajectory you’d expect, to tell a story that is more moving and human than I thought possible from this sub-genre.
As the film begins Cassie is careful to build this world around our protagonist Beatrice. We know she lives alone, in a small apartment in the middle of nowhere of Arkansas, and struggles working the home telemarketer grind. We then start to dig into her character after she is caught stealing strawberries from a local farm and is befriended by the father and daughter now living there. It’s here we get to know Beatrice, as she struggles in her attempt to let go of her mysterious past, that we can see still has a very firm grip on her. The way it’s dealt out in dribs and drabs allows us as an audience to really drink in the performance by lead – Olivia Taylor Dudley, who is giving us something much more empathetic and relatable than I expected in this role.
The reason for this we soon discover is the cult angle, but also her romantic entanglements with not only the handsome enigmatic leader Grayson, but sister wife Abigail – flawlessly executed by Riley Dandy. The dynamic of this relationship as the heart of this film is something that comes out of nowhere, and really gives Beatrice’s journey an unexpected weight. In flashbacks we witness Abigail and Beatrice’s first meeting, and how they paired off on the farm, cooking together and tending to the garden. They also had a physical relationship that grows from this intimacy, which feels free of their cult leader’s stain. When Abigail tracks Beatrice down after being interviewed on a podcast – to let her know Grayson is out of jail, this all comes flooding back to Beatrice.
The film explores cults and our society’s fascination with them, but also actually manages to touch on some very human themes, I think most are probably afraid to. Like digging into, without looking down on the psyche of someone who actually found their place, and managed to find happiness in the day to day of cult life. It’s how masterfully Cassie executes that first act, that is all about the characters outside of the cult, which makes that second act when we’re on the inside of the cult looking out, not only work, but allow us to really feel like we can empathize and understand these characters and their eventual behavior in the third act. This is thanks to not only the script that uses the cult aspect as a metaphor for toxic relationships, but the performances here by our two female leads that bring the material to life.
Abigail Before Beatrice is a moving and empathetic exploration of the ‘true believer’, that because of how it treats its perfectly crafted protagonist, is easily one of the most nuanced and captivating portrayals we’ve seen of cult life on film. It’s a nearly impossible task but writer-director Cassie Keet manages to do this without dealing out any sympathy for Beatrice and Abigail’s captor, instead showing how dangerous loneliness and its exploitation can be to certain people. Abigail Before Beatrice is the reason I come to film festivals, to have my expectations completely obliterated by a film that I had no idea even existed before I decided to hit play and now can’t shut up about. Its extremely rare, but when it happens you can’t help but want to share it with others who might be looking for something off the beaten path and definitely worth seeking out.
