Review: The Extraordinary Miss Flower – “a delightfully unusual slice of cinema.”

Directed by Iain Forsyth and Jane Pollard
Featuring Emilíana Torrini, Caroline Catz, with appearances by Nick Cave, Richard Ayoade, Alice Lowe, Siggi Baldursson, Sophie Ellis-Bextor

This is a delightfully unusual slice of cinema, that doesn’t fit into any neat, single category (no bad thing!). In 2024, the Icelandic singer Emiliana Torrini released her first new album in some time, Miss Flower, inspired by the find of a trove of letters, photographs, telexes and more by Emiliana and her friends Zoe and Simon. The correspondence belonged to Zoe’s late mother, Geraldine Flower.

They revealed years of a fascinating, secret life – romances, intrigues, international travel, even hints of possible links to espionage. This deeply inspired Torrini, who worked with her long-term collaborator, Simon Byrt, to use these as the basis for her 2024 album (which I highly recommend), but it also felt like it had more to explore, which lead to this intriguing film work with Iain Forsyth and Jane Pollard, who previously brought us the fascinating 20, 000 Days on Earth documentary about Nick Cave.

This isn’t quite a documentary, nor a regular narrative film, nor musical, but partakes of elements of all of these and more. At its core are performances of songs from the album by Torrini and her group, and dramatic scenes and readings, with an array of famous actors and musicians reading from some of the letters, while Caroline Catz plays the role of Geraldine Flower, often in a sort of conversation with Torrini, asking her about her intriguing life, about the events and the people in the letters, of life, and, of course, of love.

Choreographer Kate Coyne arranges some wonderful visual movements while Forsyth and Pollard use clever framing, little pieces of animation, set dressing and other tricks to craft something that is as visually appealing as the music and voices. Throughout it all Catz’s depiction of Geraldine is magnetic and charming and assured – it’s not hard to see why so many of the letters to her were from men clearly in love with this unusual woman – and Torrini herself, who displays an engaging charm, and radiates an energy that makes it quite clear that she is really enjoying herself in this story.

Of course, you may ask, this is all very well for someone like me who is a fan of the musician already, but what if you are not overly familiar with Emiliana Torrini’s work? Perhaps you’ve never listened to her albums, but have heard her eerie, haunting rendition of Golem’s Tale for the Lord of the Rings soundtrack. But even if you are unfamiliar with her work, this is still an intriguing and delightful piece of film and music for anyone who is interested in how a creative person is inspired, how they and others around them come together to make art, a little glimpse inside the creative process, but handled in a very warm, playful manner that left me smiling.

The Extraordinary Miss Flower premiered at the London International Film Festival, and will be opening in UK and Irish cinemas from May 9th. Thanks to the BFI for kindly arranging a preview screener for us.