Anne Hathaway has had one helluva year at the movies, and it’s not even over yet. There’s been much discussion about other actors, such as Robert Pattinson and Zendaya, having insane runs this year, and that’s very much true and deserved. But decidedly less has been said about Hathaway, who, after spending multiple years out of the spotlight, has returned in full force with some of the biggest and best movies of the year.
Both The Devil Wears Prada 2 and The Odyssey were gargantuan hits, and she was absolutely fantastic in them. There’s already a ton of early buzz surrounding her chances of being Oscar-nominated for her work in Nolan’s epic, and I will be the first to admit I was completely caught off guard by how good she and everyone else were in The Devil Wears Prada 2. I assumed the film would be an easy cash grab from a host of talented people, but the legacy sequel wound up having a lot to say about the state of journalism and evolving media trends as a whole, and Hathaway brought her all to it.
Recently, she also starred in The End of Oak Street, which I loved. But now the most underappreciated Hathaway-starring film of the year is finally getting the justice and exposure it deserves, as David Lowery’s Mother Mary has made its streaming debut to instant success on HBO Max.
If you’re unfamiliar with Mother Mary, it would seem you are not alone. The A24 film released earlier this year (one week before the release of Devil Wears Prada 2!) received divisive reviews and was gone from theaters a couple weeks later. I, dear humble reader, was among the extremely fortunate few who trekked out to see this thing opening weekend, as I am always seated for a new David Lowery film, and was absolutely blown away by what I witnessed. Mother Mary is a supernatural musical-horror-thriller-romance that sees everyone involved swinging for the fences in the most glorious of ways. It stars Hathaway and Michaela Coel, each of whom is utterly mesmerizing onscreen, in what is largely a chamber piece driven by their phenomenally palpable performances.
Written and directed by Lowery, the film’s story centers on Mother Mary (Hathaway), a pop star who, amidst emotional and creative struggles, seeks the help of a former collaborator (Coel). In the film, the music by Mother Mary is created through the combined efforts of bona fide icons of modern music, such as Jack Antonoff, Charli XCX, and FKA twigs. If the medley of all this insane musical talent combining with all of this cinematic talent doesn’t entice you at least a little bit, I’m not sure what to tell you. The film is experiential by its very nature and certainly isn’t made for the kind of ‘second-screen entertainment’ that so many streaming platforms seem to be chasing; Lowery delivers a big-screen cinematic event in every meaning of the phrase. But months after its lackluster theatrical run, Mother Mary has premiered on HBO Max and found success.
Dropping on the platform this past weekend, Mother Mary instantly shot up to the number-two position on the streamer’s charts, clearly capturing the attention of a whole host of viewers who never got the chance to see it in theaters. While I remain very skeptical, if morbidly interested, to see how this exceedingly deliberate film will play to average viewers, I am delighted to see Mother Mary garnering such attention at all. In a year full of great performances from Hathaway, her work here is the best. She delivers a long-term performance that gradually reveals increasingly nuanced layers over the course of the film, literally and figuratively carving the character open before the audience’s very eyes. It’s surreal and astounding, in equal measure.
I love Mother Mary; I’ll even be real with you and confess that it is currently my favorite film of the year. So I am hopeful that this renewed attention to it will also encourage A24 to release the movie on physical media, something they’ve seemed a bit cagey about in the past. Mother Mary will stand the test of time, and its HBO Max success is just the latest indicator of this fact.
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