Wild Rose (9/10)

by Tony Medley

Runtime 101 minutes.

R.

Highlighted by wonderful music, Jessie Buckley gives a boffo performance as Rose-Lynn Harlan, a Glasgow country singer who longs for Nashville, but it’s a far more complex and nuanced tale. After only one minute, I turned to my assistant and said, “I love this movie!” And I never changed my opinion.

Rose is just being released from jail when we meet her in Glasgow. Buckley is Irish, but her Scottish accent works. In fact, it works too well. As with many British films, the accents are so deep subtitles are required to understand what some of the characters are saying. In fact, even in the movie, she says something to one of the other characters and that character responds, “I didn’t understand a word of what you just said,” and that’s true for many of the lines in the film. When will filmmakers realize that just because the language of the movie is English, when it is highly accented English, subtitles are a necessity?

Directed by Tom Harper from a script by Nicole Taylor, Rose is the mother of a young son, Adam (Lyle Mitchell) and daughter, Wynonna (Daisy Littlefield, who gives a remarkable performance, especially for someone so young) who have been taken care of by her stern mother, Marion (Julie Walters, who also gives a fine performance). Rose’s dream is to sing at the Grand Old Opry, but her familial obligations interfere and she finds herself between a rock and a hard place.

She gets a job cleaning for a rich woman, Susannah (Sophie Okonedo), who becomes a staunch supporter, but even that has its problems.

Buckley’s performance is better than superb and her singing is wonderful. This is an actress with an Oscar® in her future.

While she carries the film, the acting is up to a high standard. This film will certainly be on my “best of the year” list and should make a lot of others, too.