Mark Jenkin’s experimental time-traversing folktale starring Callum Turner and George MacKay sent a shiver down my spine.
The movie, Rose of Nevada, is set in a Cornish coastal town where the derelict harbour is a pertinent metaphor for a town whose life has been sucked out of it, haunted by a fishing boat tragedy three decades prior.
In one household live the bereft parents of a young man called Luke, who we quickly figure out died long ago. In another, there is a widow whose husband went out to sea one day and never returned on a ship named – The Rose of Nevada.
When this eponymous vessel reappears on shore, two young men, Nick (a doting husband and father) and Liam (someone clearly lost and searching for purpose in life), agree to help man the fishing boat to pocket some extra dosh.
From here – it gets weird… and then weirder.
It’s difficult to talk about the movie beyond the first ten or so minutes without giving it all away, but the strange twists and turns the movie takes are worth experiencing in real time.
Key details: Rose of Nevada
Creator
Mark Jenkin
Cast
Callum Turner, George MacKay, Francis Magee, Rosaline Eleazar and Mary Woodvine
Runtime
1h 54min
Jenkin’s has a firm grip of the land, and sea, scape, and you feel the ominous lure of the ocean as much as the dour atmosphere of the rundown small town.
Once on board, Francis Magee comfortably steps into the Wellingtons of the hardened and foolhardy captain, guiding these two novices through the art of fishing – a practice dating back centuries.
A sinister chill coats the entire voyage and, as they pull back into harbour – Liam and Nick quickly figure out everything is not what it seems.
Now a vibrant microcosm, the duo have stepped back in time 30 years where they must face the ghosts of the past, literally and metaphorically.
As Liam is swept up into a family life he never signed up for, Nick begins his desperate search to get home to his family for whom he got onto that ship in the first place.
While the tension between the crewmates grows, each day they find themselves back on the ship – fishing, and fishing, and fishing all to no avail – with George, Callum, and Francis all turning out grounded and solid performances that reflected the layered story.
There’s a horrible claustrophobia permeating the whole feature, whether they’re trapped in the tinny boat that seems hardly fit to house three men without sinking like a rock or the existential idea that they cannot escape this wrong time.
Verdict
An unnerving tale set on the sea that will stick in your brain as the credits roll.
The more I think about the more my throat closes up – the only way out seems to be to bargain with the gods and hope they grant you passage back home.
Wrapped up within this desperation are decades of grief and love and loss to untangle, but as though magic, as one thread is pulled, yet another unravels.
A darkness runs like an undercurrent throughout the movie that threatens to pull you in – and although the idea of travelling in time seems whimsical, Rose of Nevada hammers home the horror with a grim finality.
I left the cinema feeling on edge, as though my own boat could come and whisk me away at any moment and plunge me into lands unknown.
This unsettling feature will stay with anyone who watches it, whether you like it or not.
Rose of Nevada premieres at the BFI London Film Festival on Wednesday, October 15, and Saturday, October 18. It will arrive in UK cinemas in 2026.
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