Agnes Of God

Ingmar Bergman would have had a field day with this psychological drama about a simple-minded nun, Sister Agnes (Meg Tilly), who appears to have fallen pregnant and then murdered the child whilst bound within the confines of her convent. The mix of transcendence and cruelty is pure Bergman and no doubt the producers were aware of the comparison, importing the Swedish master's cinematographer, Sven Nykvist, for the production (and it does look good).

I have not seen the play by John Pielmeyer on which the film was based but the aim clearly was to tackle some of the big questions about religious faith. This intention falls flat because Jewison completely mistakes the unexplained for the inexplicable, the end result being a murder mystery which fumbles around with the supernatural. As he also wrote the script it is hard to shift responsibility for this mis-handling.

Jane Fonda makes for an improbable psychiatrist trying to probe Sister Agnes’s mental state whilst Anne Bancroft plays the convent's worldy-wise Mother Superior.

 

Want something different?