Drama explores troubled relationship
Clever, disturbing and just a smidgen too slight, Una examines a kind of relationship not often seen on screen — that of a middle-aged sexual predator and his 13-year-old victim.
The man is played by Ben Mendelsohn, whose gaunt, craggy features get him a lot of villain roles, most recently as Orson Krennic in Rogue One. He bounces between creepy and sympathetic as Ray, who has changed his name to Peter after serving time for his sexual relationship with Una, played at 13 and with great conviction by Ruby Stokes.
We see young Una in flashbacks, including the trial when she told him, via one-way video monitor, that she loved him. But the film is set 15 years later, with Rooney Mara as the troubled adult version of the character. She’s seen Ray’s picture in a newspaper and tracks him down at work.
Thus begins an intense reunion, flashbacks interspersed with Una’s confused, accusatory questioning. The film was adapted by Scottish writer David Harrower from his 2005 play Blackbird, and directed by theatre director Benedict Andrews. A more thorough grounding in the cinema might have convinced them to drop some of the more on-the-nose dialogue and let these amazing actors show rather than tell, but the picture stays afloat in spite of the excess exposition.
And it doesn’t shy away from the weird power dynamics at play. Young Una was clearly a willing participant, but Ray just as clearly should have said no before anything happened. Instead, he keeps repeating that his affection was specific to her, not pedophiliac. “I was never one of them,” he says, practically spitting out that last word. “You were my neighbour’s daughter, not a target.”
And they still have feelings for one another, though the meaning of “still” grows more slippery the more you examine it. To renew their relationship would be creepy but not immoral, but that doesn’t add legitimacy to the original liaison. Things grow murkier still when we learn more about Ray’s new family.
There are no easy solutions or resolutions in Harrower’s screenplay. “I could have stopped,” Ray says at one point. “I should have stopped.”
“But you didn’t.” Her rebuttal lingers in the air like ash from a fire that still smoulders.