Benedetta (2021)
Verhoeven always delivers. Even when you know it is Verhoeven doing a lesbian nun movie, he still manages to keep things surprising and new. I really dig the setting with a convent with the threat of the plague looming outside. Add to the usual drama of internal power dynamics in such a place, thrown in a confidently mad woman who firmly believes she has a special connection with Jesus and she is willing to prove it. While the sexual sleaze elements aren’t exactly low key, I don’t think Verhoeven goes overboard. It serves a proper purpose to further highlight religious hypocrisy and logical fallacies. In addition, the whole thing is also simply entertaining, full of powerful satisfying and beautifully shot scenes, While we do get a male antagonist towards to end, marvelously played by Lambert Wilson, I don’t see it as Verhoeven doing a female empowerment type story here. It is a teardown of the church as an institution, and he had found an overlooked story from the history books as a great alternative to Jean d’Arc.
Rating: 4