THE STORY – A hardworking single mother is filled with romantic hope when she meets a kind local man, until an unspeakable tragedy upends her life forever.
THE CAST – Erin Doherty, James McAvoy, Liv Hill & Smylie Bradwell
THE TEAM – Paul Andrew Williams (Director)
THE RUNNING TIME – 109 Minutes
To read the TIFF description of “Faith” is to know almost everything you need to know. The film is billed as being about the life of a hardworking single mother trying to offer her kid a loving life, until she meets a kind stranger and then an unimaginable tragedy strikes. Presumably from that, you can imagine what happens. The question is: does such a painful film justify its own existence with anything cathartic, satisfying, or at least a bit redeeming? The answer is: no. Gina, played by “The Crown’s” Erin Doherty in a spectacular performance, works a hard job at a local factory in rural England. She struggles to make ends meet but her love for her nine-year-old son Jamie (Smylie Bradwell) is limitless and pure, filling her life with everything she needs. One night at a local pub quiz, she meets an enigmatic, appropriately handsome and quietly kind stranger, Michael (James McAvoy). Gina sees him as a romantic interest but Michael’s odd demeanor, at first funny and providing the film’s first half’s moment of levity, suggests otherwise. Soon, he is foretelling death and sadness, in lines that are obvious to the audience who knows what the movie is about, but in ways not yet apparent to those around him.
For the first half, “Faith” delivers some lighthearted laughs from the obvious misunderstanding between Gina and Michael and around James McAvoy’s deadpan, forlorn delivery that is purposefully out of town with how happy everyone is feeling. Soon, however, the tragedy that you are dreadfully expecting dutifully arrives, and “Faith” turns into a profoundly devastating, almost punishing film. Movies about loss and grief, and the ways in which humans grapple with such horrific experiences, abound. Most are difficult to watch but manage to persuade audiences because they respect the gravity of such experiences by refusing to lean brutally into the indescribable experiences. “Faith” makes a different choice. It deliberately choices to lean in, hard and deep, into Gina’s experience. From the horrific discovery on the morning of Jamie’s 10th birthday, to every agonizing second that follows for the next few hours. To justify such an ghastly endeavor, “Faith” teaches some revelation or payout. Religious tones, implications, motifs, and symbols abound, mostly out of Michael’s mouth but not entirely. The church is a frequent image. The ethereal, choral soundtrack by artists Raffertie & NYX make the point even more obvious.
When the payout does arrive, however, it is not only far from satisfying or even emotionally manipulative. It is too jumbled, too much hyperrealism melded with symbolism, requiring too much of a leap of faith for almost everyone in the audience. One can imagine various purposes by director Paul Andrew Williams, known for B-movies such as 2025’s “Dragonfly” and 2017’s “Broadchurch.” One could be to persuade the incredulous to believe that there is something greater, something deeper, something more powerful that surrounds us all. In this he fails, because the existence of a know-it-all being who stands by idly while Gina’s life is annihilated is never explained. Williams may say such a view is of little faith, but it is his own script that draws out a plotline that has, for millennia, failed to fully persuade millions.
Perhaps Williams’ purpose was personal and cathartic. At the TIFF World Premiere, he announced he drew on personal experience to make “Faith.” In that sense, one surely hopes the movie served that personal purpose. It is unclear at this juncture if the movie would have this effect on others who have experienced these terrible experiences, but it seems as if a movie that is fundamentally purposeful would have a hard time doing so. A third explanation is that Williams’ entire purpose was his over-the-top revelation, the absurd third act as an explanation of how one passes through the darkness back into the light. That explanation for this film seems so callous as to be almost as unimaginable as the subject matter it portrays.
And, not to be nitpicky about religious dogma and all, but the choice of Michael as McAvoy’s character’s name is curious to say the least. In Christian belief, the archangel Michael is well-known as the leader of God’s army. In Revelation, he ousts Satan. The choice of name was unlikely to be accidental since it is such a prominent name in Christianity. If it was not purposeful and was instead sloppy, that betrays the entire sincerity of the project’s purported “Faith.” If it was purposeful, then it is hard to square with the fact that the angel of grief is Azrael, and Michael has never been associated with the purpose he is somehow ascribed in this movie.
If you are looking for something to rescue it, “Faith” features two unforgettably touching performance by its lead actors. Doherty in particular does extraordinary things, with the help of loads of makeup, sure, but she is asked to play two grotesquely opposing ends of the emotional spectrum and nails them both. Clearly, she is a magnificent actress. McAvoy, too, is given the difficult role of the quiet healer, the compassionate savior. In some ways, he becomes the movie’s accidental villain, a mantle he somehow embraces while remaining sympathetic. It is too bad the material was so simultaneously manipulative and ultimately sloppy to give neither of them a bigger purpose
Ultimately, “Faith” is not without merit, and it would be unfair to pretend otherwise. Doherty is tremendous, McAvoy finds quiet notes in a role that could have been unbearable, and Williams is plainly reaching for something sincere. But sincerity is not the same as success, and the film’s anguish begins to feel less illuminating than imposed. That leaves “Faith” as a film easier to admire in fragments than to embrace as a whole. The movie keeps mistaking intensity for insight, and by the end its gestures toward transcendence feel less like revelation than evasion. Faith may be irrational by definition, but cinema still has to earn the suffering it asks us to endure. “Faith” asks for too much and gives back too little, remaining trapped by the very suffering it insists on showing us.
