39/17
A sincere theater director is tasked with recreating her former mentor’s most famous work, the opera Salome. Some disturbing memories from her past will allow her repressed trauma to color the present. This is Amanda Seyfried’s second time starring in an Atom Egoyan-directed film since Chloe (2009). Out | Best & Worst of TIFF 2023 (2023). There’s a charming and haunting Hawthorne story in which a father, a prominent avant-garde physician, fiercely protects his daughter. As a child, he gradually introduces her to a deadly poisonous plant. By the time she’s matured, anyone who comes near her will suffer and die. The plant’s poison seeps into her lifeblood. The woman is beautiful and terrifying. “Don’t you love,” he asks, “so that no one will harm you?” Her answer cuts to the bone. “Father, I would rather have loved someone.” Jeanine is a theater director trying, like the woman in Hawthorne’s story, to break free from the shadow of heartless men. Having experienced abuse at the hands of her father, mentor, husband, and now an arrogant actor—an abuse they call “love”—Jeanine tries to heal and move on without losing what is important and good. She struggles to free herself from the trap she has been set in. To find something else. “Take away one feeling, and the others grow stronger.” I love Egoyan’s films for their depth, surprising twists, and intriguing themes (passion, wrong decisions, abuse, trying to find a way forward after wrongs are done, love, perspectives other than mine, and more). Following a woman who has strayed after abuse, Seven Veils continues the typical vein of Egoyan. It’s in the Canadian Opera Company building, a few blocks from where I saw the film’s world premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival. While Egoyan spent too much time in the theater for my taste, I can see why it was done. Egoyan directed the opera company’s actual production of Salome and shaped much of it into Seven Veils. Even some of the actors from the actual opera are in the film. Jeanine is masterfully brought to life by Amanda Seyfried. Off topic—why did Seyfried have surgery? Not that she looks bad now, but she looks much better in Egoyan’s previous film, “The Barn.” (long sigh) When I think about Seven Veils, I like it more. Getting over the trauma of abuse is a fascinating subject. Someone who said they loved me hurt me deeply. Sometimes it’s hard to know that I’m worthy of love. I see my own struggles in Jeanine.