Atom Egoyan's latest feature, Seven Veils, is a fever dream of a movie, fraught with shadow figures and ghosts from the past, haunting the protagonist both on and off the stage. We follow Jeanine, portrayed by Amanda Seyfried, as she directs the opera, Salome, which thrust her late mentor, Charlie, into the spotlight. As the production moves forward, she finds herself grappling with Charlie's ghost, as well as that of her father, both of whom sexually abused her in the name of 'art'.
Seyfried gives an incredibly nuanced performance, able to bring Jeanine to her full, messy potential. There is a phoenix-like nature Seyfried creates in her character, a righteous anger that grows from a flicker to an inferno as the movie progresses, consuming her whole and spitting someone else out. Someone who wants revenge. Someone who wants her abusers to pay for what they have done. Shadows cast on a screen serve as allegory for what Jeanine went through at the hands of her abusers, conjuring up imagery reminiscent of German Expressionism, specifically as seen in The Cabinet of Doctor Calligari. The shadows in Seven Veils are used to tell a twisted story of innocence and the men that take advantage of it, be it in Salome or Jeanine's story. The two are frequently conflated over the course of the film, including how their anger grows and changes. Where Salome kisses the severed head of John the Baptist, Jeanine paints over the face of her father, the man who assaulted her, the white a stark contrast to the rest of the family photo. But though Salome finds herself killed for what she did, Jeanine is freed, able to finally escape the clutches of her father and Charlie.
This film explores how art and trauma intertwine, and how they often bleed into each other, creating something that is a Frankenstein's monster of familiarity. For Jeanine, she sees herself in Salome, and as such, fights to include personal allusions in her version of the play that often come under fire from production managers and actors alike. In addition, Egoyan is able to effectively examine the complex and unhealthy relationships in Jeanine's life via the use of her video diaries, in which she details her relationship with Charlie. She describes how reliant on him she became, and how the relationship consumed every aspect of her life, an unhealthy obsession she tries to convey to Ambur, the actress playing Salome. At one unsettling moment, Ambur decides to writhe sensually on the stage, which upsets Jeanine. It is clear by this point that the opera has grown from more than a performance. It has become a retelling of Jeanine's life story, and yet no one can seem to get the emotion right. John the Baptist, and by extent, Charlie, will always be seen as god-like figures of virtue, where Salome and Jeanine will be condemned as the ones to blame, the ones who let their emotions get the best of them, the ones who are obsessive, irrational. Discordant notes play as Jeanine realizes how she will be viewed, how she has always been viewed. She can never convey the anger that coloured her relationship, how exploitative and unhealthy it was. And where both of her abusers, Charlie and her father, have been absolved via death, Jeanine is left to pick up the pieces of her life that they shattered, left to ponder why they chose her. In addition, this film's realism is enhanced largely through Egoyan's own experience in directing the same opera for the Canadian Opera Company in 2009, with footage from his run used strategically throughout Seven Veils, often seen in Jeanine's memories or dreams of the run with Charlie at the helm.
Egoyan's passion for not only this film, but opera itself, help make Seven Veils into an entrancing, layered film that serves as an excellent exploration of the ghosts that haunt us and how trauma is processed through art.
Seyfried gives an incredibly nuanced performance, able to bring Jeanine to her full, messy potential. There is a phoenix-like nature Seyfried creates in her character, a righteous anger that grows from a flicker to an inferno as the movie progresses, consuming her whole and spitting someone else out. Someone who wants revenge. Someone who wants her abusers to pay for what they have done. Shadows cast on a screen serve as allegory for what Jeanine went through at the hands of her abusers, conjuring up imagery reminiscent of German Expressionism, specifically as seen in The Cabinet of Doctor Calligari. The shadows in Seven Veils are used to tell a twisted story of innocence and the men that take advantage of it, be it in Salome or Jeanine's story. The two are frequently conflated over the course of the film, including how their anger grows and changes. Where Salome kisses the severed head of John the Baptist, Jeanine paints over the face of her father, the man who assaulted her, the white a stark contrast to the rest of the family photo. But though Salome finds herself killed for what she did, Jeanine is freed, able to finally escape the clutches of her father and Charlie.
This film explores how art and trauma intertwine, and how they often bleed into each other, creating something that is a Frankenstein's monster of familiarity. For Jeanine, she sees herself in Salome, and as such, fights to include personal allusions in her version of the play that often come under fire from production managers and actors alike. In addition, Egoyan is able to effectively examine the complex and unhealthy relationships in Jeanine's life via the use of her video diaries, in which she details her relationship with Charlie. She describes how reliant on him she became, and how the relationship consumed every aspect of her life, an unhealthy obsession she tries to convey to Ambur, the actress playing Salome. At one unsettling moment, Ambur decides to writhe sensually on the stage, which upsets Jeanine. It is clear by this point that the opera has grown from more than a performance. It has become a retelling of Jeanine's life story, and yet no one can seem to get the emotion right. John the Baptist, and by extent, Charlie, will always be seen as god-like figures of virtue, where Salome and Jeanine will be condemned as the ones to blame, the ones who let their emotions get the best of them, the ones who are obsessive, irrational. Discordant notes play as Jeanine realizes how she will be viewed, how she has always been viewed. She can never convey the anger that coloured her relationship, how exploitative and unhealthy it was. And where both of her abusers, Charlie and her father, have been absolved via death, Jeanine is left to pick up the pieces of her life that they shattered, left to ponder why they chose her. In addition, this film's realism is enhanced largely through Egoyan's own experience in directing the same opera for the Canadian Opera Company in 2009, with footage from his run used strategically throughout Seven Veils, often seen in Jeanine's memories or dreams of the run with Charlie at the helm.
Egoyan's passion for not only this film, but opera itself, help make Seven Veils into an entrancing, layered film that serves as an excellent exploration of the ghosts that haunt us and how trauma is processed through art.