Mona Fastvold’s “The World to Come” premiered last year at the Venice Film Festival, where it won the Queer Lion for best LGBT-themed film. Apparently the movie is a romance. Somewhere in the 19th century on the border of the American East Coast, the wives of two landowners embark on a secret and tentative (and far too short) romance. The romance between Abigail and Tallie is the fulcrum of the story. Abigail, as played by Katherine Waterston, is all quiet victories and quiet sadness, while Tallie Vanessa Kirby is all smoldering glances and sensual energy. As the two women struggle to maintain their relationships amidst dissatisfied marriages, the film explores the limits of being a woman in the 19th century. That romance is central to it. Yet the plaintive and tender “The World to Come” feels better understood not as an exploration of the life-giving romance but more as a character study that explores the quiet despair of the lonely Abigail.
It’s some time before we meet Tallie. Abigail is our entry point to this story, and this is significant. Waterston’s voice arrives early in the film and returns throughout, as her voiceover narrates the narrative heard through a diary entry that gives the film much of its structure. As “The Future Comes” abruptly turns to its final act, there is a succession of scenes where the narrative becomes awkward as it mimics Abigail’s rogue nerves. The seemingly perfunctory dates go wild and as the narrative goes through days in minutes, figuring out how Fastvold’s interest in mining this woman’s perspective is key to calculating the intent of the film’s engagement with queerness.
There are two key moments that confirm this. The first is a series of flashbacks in the climax of the film, and then the film’s final moment involves an intentional transformation triggered by Abigail’s mind. I’ve been thinking about those two moments since I saw the film at the Sundance Film Festival, and considering the ways in which “The World to Come” fits in with recent depictions of lesbians on screen, and the way it evolves beyond the familiar intentions that it hints into harder and more complex ones.
Queer romance filtered through the compulsive heteronormativity of society is not unusual. Abigail and Tallie are in unhappy marriages. Abigail’s marriage to the meaningful, yet spiritless Dyer (excellently modulated Casey Affleck) is stuck in ambiguity. It’s not a horrible union but Abigail, longing for impulse, feels trapped. That impetus comes when Finney and Tallie, a newlywed couple, arrive in the area. If Abigail’s marriage is bad, then Tallie’s marriage is worse. Close to Abigail’s perspective, we see very little of the abuse at first. Instead, Fastvold’d suggests the uneasiness before confronting us with it. Chris Abbott’s grasp of the very angry Finney is one of the film’s weak links – in terms of characterization and performance – but the lightness of his villain makes sense when viewed as the true outsider in the relative silence of the border.
The middle part of the film allows Waterston and Kirby to exist in each other’s space, providing the warmth necessary to compensate for the melancholy surrounding her. In one of the strangest scenes the two women imagine a world where women have not been trapped in marriages to survive and are not victims of forced world heterosexuality. The moment does not feel like anachronistic in the forward look but rather feels like a painful moment of clarity for quiet women trapped in worlds that do not exist completely. And so, the film’s title ‘world to come’ is a distant dream. By the time the movie’s heartbreaking climax comes, the expected tragedy feels inevitable.
What do we expect from a lesbian drama, though? The questions posed to “The Future World” – some more critical than others – feel relevant. The pivot to lesbian-era romance at the center of the continuing lack of contemporary lesbian figures on film is considerable. Similarly, the ways in which the historical version of white women’s lesbian media privilege is also of concern. “The World to Come” cannot exist outside of these questions and dynamics, although supporting the queries on this particular film feels ungenerous. Screenwriters Ron Hansen and Jim Shepherd adapt Shepherd’s short story and manage to privilege this as a woman’s story, even as the film offers compelling presentations of how marriage can break down, or continue, without romantic love
The film’s engagement with the two couples has an unpredictably subtle nature as she invites and then refuses flat readings of herself. Instead, this version of the film is one that recognizes the complex nature of love and commitment. That the romance at times feels shady is indicative of the film’s own self-reflexive way of reflecting Abigail’s consciousness. And it’s essential that this is filtered from Abigail. Waterston is the linchpin in the movie, because of this. “The World to Come” plays to its potential in particular ways, internalizing its grief, resentment at the world around it and its growing aspirations in profound ways. She’s great here and Andre Chemetoff’s cinematography recognizes her face as the film’s best asset. That the film eventually ends quietly and more quietly than one might anticipate that makes sense when reconsidering as a story about this quiet and quiet woman. But looking into Waterston’s eyes is realizing that silence does not mean morality. Without saying a word, his final gaze in the film offers the promise of many better worlds to come.
The World in the Future was shown at the Sundance Film Festival as part of the Spotlight category. It is now available to view on Video on Demand.