Review of Morvern Callar (2002) by Moya S — 22 Jan 2005

Best in Show: Samantha Morton.

One for the future: Samantha Morton.

Stand-out scene: Making the deal with the publisher.

Brainer or no-brainer: Brainer.

Stands up to one viewing or repeated?: Repeated.

DVD commentary any good?: n/a.

TV.

Lynne Ramsey's Ratcatcher marked her out as a director with enormous potential. Samantha Morton has never been less than excellent in anything she's appeared in. Combine the two and the result is breath-taking. The source novel by Alan Warner was co-adapated by Ramsey herself. In Ramsey's version of the story Callar's sense of isolation is heightened by her being an Englishwoman living in a remote Scottish harbour town (Oban in the novel) and working in a supermarket. At the beginning of the story it seems that Callar cannot bear to be parted from the body of her boyfriend but once she makes the decision to pass his novel off as her own she has to dispose of the body herself (a grisly scene). As everyone in the town knows that he is a writer it is perhaps inevitable that her deception will eventually be uncovered, but in not reporting his death to the police he will continue to be a missing person for the time being and she can sell the publishing rights in her own name without immediate reproach. The second half of the movie deals with her and a friend's holiday to Ibiza where Callar's behaviour becomes increasingly more erratic (although the viewer is aware that she's been erratic from the get-go). A film with no easy answers, it deals with issues of grief, betrayal and deception in a realistic, thought-provoking manner throughout. Oustanding.