Carrie Coon, center, in the movie “The Liberation.”
(Bleecker Street)
It took me a while to realize this was a stealth horror film — even though it derives from the real-life history of director Guy Nattiv’s grandmother — and once you come to that understanding, it casts an insidious spell. A Holocaust survivor, New Jersey assistant bank manager Rita (Carrie Coon), like many frustrated middle-aged women of the early 1980s, found solace in different company, joining a women’s group and getting in touch with a deeper sense of self. It was not her fault that this group happened to be a cult, one that exploited her financially, sexually and spiritually, alienating Rita from her husband and two daughters. Nattiv clearly has a lot of anger, turning the structure of a story that usually has an inspiring ending (see “The Debut”) into something dark and cautionary. But I couldn’t shake it for days. Coon, on a staggering recent run that includes “His Three Daughters” and “The White Lotus,” is endlessly fascinating, toggling between desperation and euphoria, while also bringing the best out of co-stars Tracy Letts and Bella Ramsey. — J. Rothkopf
