The Forgiven Review

The Forgiven was previously reviewed as part of our TIFF 2021 coverage.

PLOT: A couple, David & Jo (Ralph Fiennes & Jessica Chastain), are visiting Morocco to participate in a debauched weekend of excess hosted at a friend’s desert manor. On their way, a drunken David accidentally hits and kills a young boy. The boy’s father, a Berber tribal leader, makes only one request – David must come with him to the desert to bury his son amongst his people. Although reluctant, David agrees while his wife stays behind to indulge in all the drinking, drugs and hookups her hosts have to offer.

REVIEW: Genius must run in the McDonagh family. Arguably the best moviemaking siblings since Ridley and Tony Scott, John Michael McDonagh and brother Martin McDonagh (In Bruges, The Three Billboards Outside Ebbing Missouri) both have a pitch-black sense of humour. But, they also share a deeply moral streak that often seeks to redeem irredeemable (or so it seems) characters.

The Forgiven will likely open John Michael McDonagh up to a larger audience than he’s gotten so far, thanks to the dynamic star turns by Ralph Fiennes and Jessica Chastain. Thematically, it’s right in line with some of his other, under-seen gems, such as The Guard, Calvary, and most recently, War on Everyone.

Fiennes’ David is the perfect McDonagh character. An alcoholic who has nothing but withering contempt for all around him, including his wife, he initially seems pretty non-plussed about having killed the Berber boy. He has to be encouraged to show remorse and seems like a heel, but throughout the film, he receives an education in humanity to some degree. Fiennes is initially hilarious with his heavy put-downs but eventually reveals a hidden vulnerability and empathy that’s experts conveyed, even if he likely knows that deep down, he may be beyond the forgiveness the title suggests.

Jessica Chastain gets to spread her wings as David’s wife, a failed children’s book author who seems to hate her husband’s attitudes but is eventually revealed to be just as full of contempt for everyone and everything as he is. Immediately after he leaves, she ditches the concerned wife mask, latches on to Christopher Abbott’s sly American investment analyst, and enjoys the bacchanal, with a weekend of sex, drugs, and drinking. Matt Smith and Caleb Landry Jones (a favorite of both McDonaghs) are hilarious as the over-the-top gay libertines, who delight in how risqué and perhaps dangerous their lifestyle is in Morocco, but party it up nonetheless. If their world is coming to an end, they’ll be too f***ed up to notice.

McDonagh’s contempt seems heaviest for some of the pseudo-intellectuals who are at the weekend-long party, happy to indulge in drugs and drink but not above lecturing their hosts. One memorable moment has Marie-Josée Croze as a French journalist lecturing Chastain about American imperialism while poised, on her knees, in front of a massive rail of coke. Everyone here is full of shit, McDonagh seems to be saying, except maybe Fiennes as he journeys deeper into the desert.

Ismael Kanater is brilliant as the boy’s grieving dad, whose motivations may or may not be murderous. He evokes tremendous sympathy throughout despite initially seeming mysterious and aloof. Saïd Taghmaoui serves as Fiennes’ guide and interpreter and makes for a fascinatingly torn character. He is loyal to his tribe and envious of Fiennes’ western comforts – especially his beautiful wife.

Despite its dark comic soul, The Forgiven eventually turns out to be a surprisingly empathetic film, but what’s interesting is that it almost could have been set 100 years ago amongst colonials somewhere else with minimal changes (less cocaine, maybe). In the end, the story it tells has happened before and will happen again. It suggests that despite people perhaps thinking we live in an enlightened age, the more things change, the more they stay the same.

Ralph Fiennes

AMAZING

9