Mother Mary

Directed by David Lowery, Mother Mary follows a mediocre pop star (Anne Hathaway’s Mary) as she attempts to convince an estranged friend (Michaela Coel’s Sam) to design a dress for her latest tour. Filmmaker Lowery, armed with his own screenplay, delivers a stultifying, endless disaster that strikes all the wrong notes right from the word go, as the movie, which runs an absolutely interminable 112 minutes, kicks off with a thoroughly disagreeable opening stretch focused on the one-note, repetitive back-and-forth between Hathaway and Coel’s respective (and hopelessly underdeveloped) protagonists – with the arms-length atmosphere perpetuated by Lowery’s laughably pretentious approach and a recurring emphasis on scenes and digressions that go absolutely nowhere. (The ongoing inclusion of Mary’s astonishingly terrible songs does little to allay the unwatchable feel.) By the time the movie switches gears and becomes an aggressively tedious ghost story, Mother Mary has confirmed its place as a complete and utter misfire (and cinematic experiment gone horribly wrong) that makes a strong case for Lowery’s exile from Hollywood.

no stars out of ****