‘Mother’ review: Noomi Rapace stars as Mother Theresa in one-dimensional biopic

Dir: Teona Strugar Mitevska. Belgium/North Macedonia/Sweden/Denmark/Bosnia & Herzegovina. 2025. 104mins

Looking for to create an origin story of types for the lady the world got here to know as Mom Teresa, Macedonian filmmaker Teona Strugar Mitevska constructs a personality research whose frenzied dramatic depth fails to supply contemporary insights into the hallowed, controversial spiritual determine. Mom stars Noomi Rapace because the Mom Superior over the course of 1 important week in 1948 as she awaits information concerning her request to begin her personal order — a pivotal growth that shall be threatened by alarming information on the convent she desires to depart. Mitevska invitations us to ponder the flesh-and-blood nun, not the blandly saintly public picture, however this prickly, generally punk-rock take finally ends up feeling simply as one-dimensional.

Mom’s storytelling feels overheated and superficially sensational

Mom is Mitevska’s third straight image to premiere at Venice, following The Happiest Man In The World and 21 Days Till The Finish Of The World. She beforehand made one other challenge about Mom Teresa, the 2010 documentary collection Teresa And I, which included interviews with the final residing nuns who had been a part of her order. Opening Venice’s Horizons part, Mom might appeal to headlines (whereas angering the trustworthy) by suggesting that the Catholic saint, who died in 1997 aged 87, may very well be a calculating, unbending taskmaster who put her personal ambitions above all else. 

In August 1948 in Calcutta, Mom (Rapace) anxiously anticipates phrase from the Vatican, hoping she shall be given uncommon permission to launch her personal order. The monastery’s Father Friedrich (Nikola Ristanovski) doesn’t need her to depart, satisfied that nobody might exchange her dedication to serving to the poor and the younger. Mom has a candidate in thoughts, nevertheless: shut confidant Sister Agnieszka (Sylvia Hoeks), who she has been getting ready for the job. However as soon as Mom discovers Agnieszka’s stunning secret — she’s pregnant — she should resolve the way to navigate the doable scandal.

Mitevska has expressed a kinship for Mom Teresa, who, just like the director, is Albanian and hailed from Macedonia. So her method to this materials is supposed to be sympathetic whereas additionally important, insisting on eradicating the halo from this inspirational determine with the intention to look at her flaws and unwillingness to compromise. Rapace’s stern gaze works wonders in capturing the character’s extreme management type, operating the convent like a boot camp with herself because the unsmiling drill sergeant. (As we are going to be taught, Mom prefers assigning the sisters numbers moderately than at all times calling them by identify.)

The nun’s excessive expectations for others additionally lengthen to herself — she incessantly rearranges the furnishings in her room, believing that one ought to by no means grow to be too comfy. However Mom hints on the methods during which Mom has not at all times behaved in a godly method. There are rumours that her 10-year working relationship with Father Friedrich might have, at one level, crossed into one thing romantic, and likewise her shut bond with Agnieszka has impressed whispers of impropriety. Mitevska, who co-wrote the screenplay, leaves these questions unanswered, however suffice to say that the Mom Teresa we meet in Mom could be petty and play favourites, her unshakeable allegiance to the Almighty justifying (in her personal thoughts, anyway) her periodically merciless or inconsiderate actions.

Mom’s opening sound is that of a guitar’s loud energy chords, a sign of Mitevska’s brash rejection of piety when portraying Mom, who bristles on the Church’s patriarchy and preaches the significance of an ascetic way of life. Fiercely against abortion, Mom should give you one other answer to maintain the monastery from discovering out about Agnieszka’s being pregnant, which might wreck Mom’s probabilities to be given her personal order.

As Mom is pressured to confront the inflexible ethical certainty she wields over others, there’s potential for a riveting, nuanced exploration of a spiritual chief whose sterling fame was criticised by some, who accused her of caring extra about ministry than in really serving to the poor. The movie hints at these complexities as soon as Mom grapples with what to do about Agnieszka, main her to wonder if her spiritual devotion is as altruistic as she assumed.

Frustratingly, as a result of an excessive amount of of Mom’s storytelling feels overheated and superficially sensational, Mitevska fails to realize the daring reconsideration she intends. Flamboyant dream sequences and awkwardly bombastic performances pitch the image at an operatic tenor that sheds little gentle on the lady on the script’s centre. The movie repeatedly tries to subvert viewers’ impressions of Mom Teresa, daring to make a beloved Catholic determine difficult, even unlikeable. However that technique can be extra profitable if Mitevska had sharp concepts to go together with her vaguely provocative tone. Sometimes inserting clattering laborious rock on the soundtrack isn’t the identical as basically rethinking a saint whose messy humanness has hardly ever been given its due.