Carrie Coon and Lily James grew to understand their roles in the cult thriller The Liberation — compounded by the fact that director Guy Nattiv based the film on his own grandmother.
Coon plays Rita, an unhappy woman who finds a place she feels she belongs. Under the mentorship of Ricki King (James), Rita unburdens herself. Eventually, though, Ricki convinces Rita to give her money and divorce her husband. The trio spoke about the film at Deadline’s Contenders Film Los Angeles on Saturday.
“I just was so moved by Guy’s grandmother’s story and the way Guy has humanized every step,” Coon said. “We understand just how radical what she’s doing is. As a woman, I understand why she might want to cede all agency to someone else. I understand why a patriarchal structure wasn’t fulfilling to her.”
Coon also called The Liberation a love story between Rita and Ricki. Likewise, James did not want to make Ricki a caricature villain.
“We really wanted to do that to find the total humanity in these women,” James said. “It’s not the villain. It’s so much more complicated. The fact that she could switch from generosity and empathy and love and kindness to savagery and annihilation. When you’re out, you’re out. Her motivations are so clear. She truly believes she’s saving these women. She truly believes she has this power. I could lead with strength.”
Nattiv remembered the changes in his grandmother when he was a child. After the real Rita’s death, he visited the cult leader and was able to ask some real questions before she expelled him.
“She was miserable and unhappy,” the writer-director said. “Then she became happy again. Then she started dancing and started to find herself again, which made sense to us as a family. It didn’t make sense when money started disappearing and she was advised to divorce my grandfather and live for good somewhere in America writing postcards. I didn’t see my grandmother until after she passed.”
Coon’s real-life husband, Tracy Letts, plays Rita’s husband, Reuben. They have two daughters, played by Bella Ramsey and Odessa Young.
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“Who are we to say what someone needs to process their trauma?” Coon said. “We don’t get to decide for somebody else. The tragedy and the pain played out in Bella and Odessa and Tracy … you feel the loss. Bella is the cypher for the audience.”
The real Rita also was the sole survivor of her family in the Holocaust. Coon studied her testimonies about surviving.
“Speaking the unspeakable is a very challenging act and so many people have to brace themselves,” Coon said. “The video gets stopped very frequently. I wanted to dignify that experience because I’m not culturally Jewish. I would never want that to feel not lived in.”
The Liberation will have a Oscar-qualifying theatrical run this year and open January 8.
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