The defence The Prestige Tourist
“Sincerity is not manipulation.”
The film risks embarrassment to make emotion communal, and that openness is harder than fashionable detachment.
Back to trending 
Novitiate
Drama · 2017
In the early 1960s, during the Vatican II era, a young woman training to become a nun struggles with issues of faith, sexuality and the changing church.
Movie details
Novitiate
2017 Drama 2h 3m
Critical arithmetic
One number, for now.
Scores change. Arguments endure.
TMDB
6.5 / 10
Community rating
In the early 1960s, during the Vatican II era, a young woman training to become a nun struggles with issues of faith, sexuality and the changing church.
CriticWise case file
What this film says about your taste.
Not a recommendation score. A measure of how closely the film’s taste signals resemble yours.
The archetype split
Who fights over Novitiate?
For the defence
The Prestige Tourist
“You like your greatness pre-approved.”
Read their case For the prosecution
The Popcorn Loyalist
“Big screen, big feelings, no apologies.”
Read their objectionThe split comes from the same five-axis model used by the test, not audience ratings or review sentiment.
Taste neighbourhood
Nearby on the taste map.
TMDB supplies the candidates. CriticWise reorders them by craft, strangeness, prestige, emotion, and pace.
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The Miseducation of Cameron Post
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Nymphomaniac: Vol. I
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Lolita
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Humbert Humbert is a middle-aged British novelist who is both appalled by and attracted to the vulgarity of American culture. When he comes to stay at the boarding house run by Charlotte Haze, he soon becomes obsessed with Lolita, the woman's teenaged daughter.
Father Stu
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The true-life story of boxer-turned-priest. When an injury ends his amateur boxing career, Stuart Long moves to Los Angeles to find money and fame. While scraping by as a supermarket clerk, he meets Carmen, a Sunday school teacher who seems immune to his bad-boy charm. Determined to win her over, the longtime agnostic starts going to church to impress her. However, a motorcycle accident leaves him wondering if he can use his second chance to help others, leading to the surprising realization that he's meant to be a Catholic priest.
Xiu Xiu: The Sent-Down Girl
Drama · 1998
Young teen girl Xiu Xiu is sent away to a remote corner of the Sichuan steppes for manual labor in 1975 (sending young people to there was a part of Cultural Revolution in China). A year later, she agrees to go to even more remote spot with a Tibetan saddle tramp Lao Jin to learn horse herding.
Dead Man Walking
Drama · 1995
A death row inmate turns for spiritual guidance to a local nun in the days leading up to his scheduled execution for the murders of a young couple.
Girl, Interrupted
Drama · 1999
Set in the changing world of the late 1960s, Susanna Kaysen's prescribed "short rest" from a psychiatrist she had met only once becomes a strange, unknown journey into Alice's Wonderland, where she struggles with the thin line between normal and crazy. Susanna soon realizes how hard it is to get out once she has been committed, and she ultimately has to choose between the world of people who belong inside or the difficult world of reality outside.
Where it lives
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Names above the title
The people responsible.
Cast & crew
Directed by
Margaret Betts
Written by
Margaret Betts
Margaret Qualley
Sister Cathleen
Melissa Leo
Reverend Mother
Julianne Nicholson
Nora Harris
Dianna Agron
Sister Mary Grace
Lisa Stewart
Sister Genevieve
Morgan Saylor
Sister Evelyn
Liana Liberato
Sister Emily
Court is in session
Put Novitiate on trial.
Two incompatible taste archetypes. One film. Read the arguments, then issue a completely binding cultural ruling.
The prosecution The Popcorn Loyalist
“The strings are showing.”
Every cue tells you exactly what to feel and when, leaving sentiment to do the work character should have done.