Newcomer Kíla Lord Cassidy was also phenomenal in a performance that requires enormous physicality and emotion. I know I am inherently an empathetic audience member, but her character’s emotions became my emotions as I could feel Lib’s anxiety, desperation, and determination permeating through every scene, growing more and more frantic as the situation begins to spiral out of control. The entirety of the audience’s point of view is seen through Lib’s eyes and Pugh handles the responsibility with ultimate precision. Her performance, as a level-headed seeker of the truth, has you in the palm of her hand the second the movie starts, and that is incredibly important for such a character-heavy story. And a large part of that is due to the phenomenal performance by Florence Pugh, who puts the entire film on her shoulders and continues to show she is one of the best actors of her generation. Some may consider THE WONDER to be a slow-burn mystery, but I found myself so lost in the story, I didn’t realize how much time had passed when the credits began to roll. As a woman of science, whose job depends on her rationality and pragmatism, Lib must determine if this really is a miracle, as many people in the town believe, or are there people with ulterior motives manipulating the issue?Īs Anna’s health gets more and more dire, Lib’s respect for the culture and beliefs of those around her gives way to frustration and anger as she is determined to get to the bottom of it before the situation becomes deadly. So Lib and a nun take turns conducting 8-hour shifts with Anna to see if she is sneaking food or being helped in any way. It is unclear how Anna is still alive, much less in as good of health as she appears.

She has been asked to monitor Anna (Kíla Lord Cassidy), an 11-year-old girl who allegedly has not eaten in 4 months she claims she is being nourished by manna from Heaven.

Set in 1860s Ireland, shortly after the potato famine that killed ~1 million people, the story follows Lib (Florence Pugh), an English nurse who is sent to a small town in Ireland.

Is the village harboring a saint 'surviving on manna from heaven' or are there more ominous motives at work? A psychological thriller inspired by the 19th century phenomenon of the 'fasting girls' and adapted from the acclaimed novel by Emma Donoghue (Room).Based on the novel by Emma Donoghue, THE WONDER is an eerie and enthralling thriller that explores the conflict between fact and faith. Tourists and pilgrims mass to witness the girl who is said to have survived without food for months. English nurse Lib Wright is brought to a tiny village to observe eleven-year old Anna O'Donnell. The Irish Midlands, 1862 - a young girl stops eating but remains miraculously alive and well.

The wonder emma donoghue review