Set in 1856, somewhere along Schoharie County, New York, The World to Come opens with Abigail (Katherine Waterston), a shy, introverted wife to her farmer husband Dyer (Casey Affleck), narrating their isolated existence with little pride and less hope. The couple struggles with the upkeep of their farm, all the while mourning their daughter who recently died of diphtheria, which has led Abigail become mute and motionless with grief. She has stopped going to church, instead of finding comfort recording her thoughts in her diary.
Settling herself in the lifeless void, Abigail narrates how she no longer derives comfort from the thought of a better world to come. Enter Tallie (Vanessa Kirby) with her husband Finney (Christopher Abbot), who have rented the neighboring farm. Abigail and Tallie are immediately smitten with each other from the moment their eyes meet. When they finally come face to face, Abigail becomes enchanted with Tallie’s beautiful rose appearance, and the frank conversation with which she engages Abigail. When the time comes for Tallie to leave, Abigail lays on the table, arms stretched exploding with astonishment and joy.
Love is a transcendent emotion that makes you feel alive despite the pain it might leave you with. It strikes in unexpected ways, overwhelming you with desire, happiness, and joy. For Abigail, Tallie’s appearance in her life has ignited this deeply buried emotion she thought she would never feel. With limited choices and daily chores to occupy their mind, the women take comfort in each other by identifying common choices they both were dealt with in matters of marriage and motherhood. Soon their friendship blossoms into romance as they put all of the trust, care, and courage into a shared existence of protecting themselves in their city of joy. Which solely existed in their dreams, while brewing suspicions and jealousy from their husbands.
Mona Fastvold directs from a script written by Ron Hansen and Jim Shepard, adapted from Shepard’s original short story The World to Come. Fastvold puts much care into creating the details of the environment and time these characters have found themselves surviving in. The story portrays an honest, unromantic look at the difficult and lonely lives the women during that period must have faced. Cinematographer André Chemetoff takes control of the pleasing imagery shot on 16mm, with Daniel Blumbery swooning in with his clarinet-heavy score.
While poetic, Fastvold at times balances the story on a thin line between drama and horror, taking the period drama into its harsh realities. The blizzard which Tallie finds herself early in the movie proves to be a brutal and nightmarish sequence that leaves everyone petrified. While the movie takes a chunk of its time with Abigail and Tallie, it doesn’t forget their husbands. Finney’s terrifying and possessive nature explodes with his old testament views, Especially about the wifely duties Tallie should perform instead of rushing away daily to meet the neighbor. Dyer’s handling of the situation is different, as he reluctantly accepts Abigail’s affection towards Tallie, and only asks for her sympathy in return.
The World to Come is filled with two electrifying performances from Waterston and Kirby. The chemistry between them is so natural and deep that you can’t help but fall in love with them. Waterston is given the mantle to deliver the frequent intimate monologues composed by Abigail in her diary. While the prose nature of their dialogue overwhelms at times, it is the unspoken words, the clenching of the jaw, the kiss, stolen glances, and tenderness between Kirby and Waterston that confirm their feelings of love. Supporting Waterston and Kirby are Affleck, in his role as the ever-reliable, down to earth, soft-spoken, helpless husband, and Abbot in a darker shade, embodying a terrifying husband to Kirby.
It is hard not to ignore how the story finds itself in the familiar tropes of Sapphic period pieces, where the cottage-core lesbians should have lived happily ever after, but again the makers decide not to go down that road. Nevertheless, The World to Come achieves what it set out to do by delivering a spellbinding and rapturous romance in a harsh setting where the labor of wives during those centuries was left unacknowledged.
