Lance Hammer’s first feature in 18 years, Queen at Sea, is a story of destructive kindness and harrowing ethical dilemmas. Tapping into difficult themes such as consent and independence in the throes of dementia, the film relentlessly explores unanswerable questions and uses three sensational performers as vessels to make the drama both glorious and completely subversive.
A delicate opening scene of an elderly couple walking arm in arm up a public staircase is quickly shattered by harsh imagery that drags the story into harsh, unforgiving reality. Amanda (Juliette Binoche), a middle-aged single new professor, takes her teenage daughter Sarah (Florence Hunt) to a Victorian apartment in north London, where she discovers her elderly mother Leslie (Anna Calder-Marshall) living under the wing of her adoptive father Martin (Tom Courtenay). Leslie’s expression appears to be very unpleasant, and Amanda’s furious reaction as she chases Martin away from her mother suggests that this is a repeat offense. Being a conscientious daughter, she finally had enough this time and called the police to inform them of her mother’s dementia.
Within minutes, Hammer and his actors use just a few words to paint an uncomfortable portrait of a life in flux, introducing us to a story at a tipping point. Although Amanda has made it clear that Leslie does not agree (and her mother’s doctor confirms this), Martin’s actions are motivated by more complex motives than simple selfishness and greed.
That the film opens with a sexual assault is never in doubt, given its violent visual framework. However, the work also avoids didactic elements. First, by centering Martin’s claim that he knew his wife and should have been aware of her desires, and second, by focusing on Amanda’s immediate regret at involving the authorities when it might have meant separating the elderly couple. Martin is deeply in love with Leslie and is her primary carer, but Amanda and her daughter have only temporarily moved from Newcastle to look after her.
The film quickly shifts into procedural mode, with Leslie undergoing ostensibly legitimate legal proceedings, including a rape kit. But her disease is so advanced that she is barely able to speak and has little idea of what she is going through. Even though Amanda was comforting her as the doctors carefully performed clinical tests, she couldn’t help but feel the investigation was impersonal. It’s hard not to get caught up in the increasingly complex emotional details, as if characters who were just strangers moments ago have become family.
We are made not only observers of dramatic situations, but also participants in Hammer’s Ken Loach-like social realist moral theater. The dualism of good and evil is unhelpful when there are so many other things to consider, from living history to messy power relations and living conditions. Despite Amanda’s complaints, she wants Martin to continue caring for Leslie, and the more we see their interactions, the more we want that for her too.
The heart of the film lies in the naturalistic performances of the leads. As a deeply sympathetic caregiver, Courtenay expresses equal parts frustration and compassion, blending the stubborn protests of a man in his later years with the lifelong tenderness and wisdom that often accompany them. Binoche, on the other hand, leans on a knife’s edge, playing out each scene with an undercurrent of exhausted helplessness, increasingly unsure of what’s right for his mother and stepfather.
But Calder-Marshall plays a pivotal role in how Queen at Sea unfolds, both thematically and melodically. She is tasked with stripping Leslie, once a perfect human, of her most basic instincts in a way that still reflects the light of her former self. It’s easy to imagine another version of her role, defined by wild nonverbal gestures and patient desperation. But even more than her co-stars, she turns her instincts inward, resulting in a surprisingly sensitive performance that brings clarity to cloudy moments. There’s a palpable humanity in her blank gaze, and the camera makes you wonder what’s going on behind her eyes – a mystery that looms over the entire story.
The film raises questions about how this family should move forward, while also frequently cutting to the seemingly unrelated coming-of-age dramas of Sarah, a teenager experiencing a sexual awakening. That she seems to care so little about her mother and grandmother is true to the circumstances of her life, for better or worse. This can be frustrating to watch, but it also makes for an interesting narrative mirror. Her cute relationships with her classmates are a risky move, but compared to what older generations went through – mothers separated from their husbands, grandparents in constant care who are on the verge of being torn apart – it’s something of a miracle that she’s even remotely open to romance.
Perhaps an invisible optimism guides Sarah, secretly imbuing the film with a sense of elation despite its dark subject matter. Most recent movies about dementia, such as Michael Haneke’s “Amour” and Florian Zeller’s “The Father,” tend to focus on the devastation it brings. This also applies to Queen of the Sea, but what makes this work stand out is its depiction of eternal love, which makes the loss of memory and function a tragedy.
The contours of these themes are meticulously carved out between Hammer’s screenplay, which is based on detailed research on the subject matter at hand (even down to casting experts in elder care and sexual assault in supporting roles), and the incredible visual dexterity of Train Dreams cinematographer Adolfo Veloso. The rich 35mm frame is shot with stillness that emphasizes the haunting emptiness around the characters. Still, Veloso’s short shutter angle allows the camera to lend a fantastic sense of urgency to the proceedings, thereby reducing the motion blur typical of action films. (You may recognize it from the Omaha Beach scene in Saving Private Ryan).
The use of such intuitive techniques in a restrained drama sometimes has the effect of making Leslie’s interactions with the outside world feel surprisingly forced. But most of the time, even though we associate aesthetics with chaos and momentum, our brains get used to it. Applying this texture to long static scenes will keep you on edge in a subtle and subconscious way. You may even forget why you were anxious in the first place, or if there was anything you were expecting in the first place. It’s like walking into a room and constantly experiencing the feeling of losing all awareness of why you’re there. There have been many films about dementia, but few have so accurately portrayed the unsettling effects of dementia.
There’s never a moment when the story idea isn’t clear, so you stay emotionally connected to everything that’s happening. Yet you are still adrift. Like Leslie, his primal attachment to Martin is both comfort and a source of existential conflict. Perhaps the film’s most impressive move, this central drama not only calms the audience, but also provides much-needed relief. It’s similar to how Amanda slowly begins to see Martin as an important piece of the puzzle: that she was once her mother.
