Ammonite

November 20 - 22:
FRI-SUN 3:45 6:30
(Closed Monday - Thursday)

(UK, Australia, USA / 2020 / Written and Directed by Francis Lee)

From the beginning of Ammonite, writer/director Francis Lee trusts his lead performers to convey an incredible amount without dialogue. And that trust pays off. In two remarkable performances, Kate Winslet and Saoirse Ronan bring subtlety and raw emotion to the relationship they portray. Reaching for something deeper than a biopic or a history lesson, Ammonite is a story of something we all seek – human connection, even when it seems impossible to find.  

Mary lives with her mother (Gemma Jones) in a gray and windswept town on England’s southwest coast, where she devotes her days to finding and cataloging fossils that she sells in a seaside shop. She’s responsible for some major finds, including an ichthyosaur skeleton on display in the British Museum, yet the Geological Society of London is full of aristocratic men and not exactly a welcome place for a shopkeeping woman – “all boys together,” she justly notes. While Mary lacks the recognition she deserves, she clings deliberately to the autonomy her work allows her. As she walks rocky shores in search of stones with mud under her feet and waves crashing round, day in and day out, her routine is her independence.

This is disrupted when Roderick, a fellow scientist (James McArdle) who seems to have an honest appreciation for her work, pays to tag along on one of her expeditions. An obliviously enthusiastic visitor, he presumes he’s welcome to absorb her expertise and barely registers Mary’s disdain. While not entirely unkind, he is similarly oblivious and patronizing toward his wife, Charlotte (Saoirse Ronan), ordering her food for her and dismissing her feelings with comments like “Don’t make a fuss.” Mary pays Charlotte no mind until Roderick hires her to keep his wife busy in the belief that walks in the sea air will help her “mild melancholia.” At first, Mary is impatient with her charge and Charlotte is used to softer treatment. But as an undeniable understanding grows between them, so does a physical passion. Filmed without a shred of prudishness, Ammonite foregoes period gloss for a portrait of desire that feels so much more true. And in showing the full gamut of Mary’s astringent brilliance and unvarnished lust, Winslet delivers one of the very best performances of her career.

R / 2 hrs.