"Hot on the heels of "The Brutalist," Mona Fastvold and Brady Corbet have returned with another sweeping historical epic about a European iconoclast who comes to America in order to build a new kind of church. Even more excitingly, "The Testament of Ann Lee" - a speculative, feverish, and altogether rapturous biopic about the Mancunian preacher who founded the Shakers and believed herself to be the female incarnation of Christ on Earth -"
"Sure, its characters are prone to singing and dancing when the spirit grabs them (a divinely heightened play on the "Quaking Shakers'" full-body approach to religious devotion), but the film's euphoric "movements" cleave a lot closer to prayers than to traditional numbers. Oscar-winning composer Daniel Blumberg transfigures a dozen traditional hymns into propulsive and electrifying choral jams that thrum with biblical fervor,"
"As in a more straightforward musical, the Shakers are using song and dance to express a range of feelings that plainspoken words couldn't hope to convey. But the exultation of these movements, and of the rest of Fastvold's film beyond them - which, like "The Brutalist," she co-wrote with life partner Corbet - has much less to do with any lyrical content than it does with the elation of collective harmony."
The Testament of Ann Lee portrays the Mancunian preacher who founded the Shakers and believed herself the female incarnation of Christ, arriving in America to build a new church. Characters break into song and full-body dance when seized by spirit, with movements functioning more like prayers than conventional musical numbers. Composer Daniel Blumberg rewrites traditional hymns into propulsive, electrifying choral pieces, while choreographer Celia Rowlson-Hall arranges the congregation into a human altar. The film centers on collective harmony, the ecstatic joy of shared purpose, and the evangelical labor of converting spiritual conviction into action.
Read at IndieWire
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