'Mother Mary' review: Anne Hathaway & Michaela Coel serve looks, resentment & ghosts

A24

And that is how you pander to stan accounts on the internet with your title. She is, simply put, giving mother. Anne Hathaway's extraordinarily busy 2026 kicked off with Mother Mary, writer-director-editor David Lowery's psychological drama possessing an enthusiasm towards pop music, fashion, style, relationships and ghosts. Hathaway stars as the titular pop star who is getting ready for a comeback of sorts after some hazy, tragic events affected her career and well-being. For this, she's looking for the right outfit, which propels her to travel to England in the hope of rekindling the connection with Sam Anselm (Michaela Coel), her former costume designer and friend-expect-possibly-more-than-a-friend. As this dynamic duo attempt to hash it out, old grievances and feelings flare up once again, leading them on an otherworldly expedition.

We might as well waste no time and dig into those aforementioned elements, and we shall start with some positive news. The film is at its strongest when it's a ghost story, not only because Lowery has the skill set to conjure up arresting images, but also because Coel's committed, bewitching and dynamic performance is a sight to behold despite the relentless and even pretentious dialogue the helmer gives her and Hathaway to work with. Coel's expressive face is the project's simple weapon whilst the combination of Bina Daigeler's chic costume design, Francesca Di Mottola's moody production design and some trippy editing is the elaborate one. Even though your patience is ultimately tested since the pacing and storytelling are rather uneven, the visual language pulls you back in every now and then.

Unfortunately, though, that is not enough. One weight pulling the whole thing down is the character of Mother Mary and another is her relationship with Sam. There's just zero narrative propulsion, zero dramatic tension and no significant depth to be found here. I didn't find myself caring about the duo's rift, Mother Mary's personal ghosts—haunting a life of remarkable privilege, mind you—or her lost sense of identity that she is trying to regain by repairing this lost connection. Hathaway's acting isn't helping much either as her choices are quite vague and repetitive. And when you don't care about those things or the central performance, spending 100 minutes in these spaces will feel like a really long time. I'm sure many will agree.

It's also hard to say if the movie's pop music was meant to reflect Mother Mary's fear of rawness, honesty and vulnerability. Either that or songwriter-producers Charli xcx and Jack Antonoff just made more overly produced music with lazy lyricism out of pure habit since it has plagued their own careers in recent years. However, considering the film's self-importance as well as fear of both emotional and physical nakedness, we can assume that almost everyone here was throwing spaghetti at the wall and hoping that great, noteworthy and meaningful art would come out of it. The bad news is that the movie is indeed neither great, noteworthy nor meaningful. Don't call it a comeback. Call it a major letdown.

Smileys: Michaela Coel

Frowneys: Screenplay, characterisation

When Mother Mary wants to use one of those witchy monologues in a song, she needs to clear the Sam-ple.

2.0/5

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