![\"Queen](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/queen-at-sea-2.jpg\"\/)
<\/p>\nWhen the police are called regarding a situation involving an elderly couple, dementia and consent, the family at the centre of it find themselves engulfed in an increasingly painful and devastating set of circumstances.<\/p>\n
The first time we see Anna Calder-Marshall\u2019s Leslie and Tom Courtenay\u2019s Martin, it is from the back. Even so, you can feel the mutual compassion, the love, the support, this old married couple hobbling up some steps together, arm in arm, her gripping the bannister, him grasping a walking stick. For an opening shot, it does a lot of heavy lifting. An uphill struggle? You bet.<\/p>\n
When we next see them, a couple of minutes later, another perspective, and another act of love. Seemingly. It is daytime in their modest north London house, and Leslie\u2019s daughter Amanda (Juliette Binoche) walks in on them having sex. It\u2019s a functional, humdrum sex scene \u2013 Leslie, in fact, looks practically lifeless. Amanda, distraught, lashes out at a sheepish Martin, her stepfather, reminding him that she\u2019s told him again and again not to do this, that if he kept doing so, she would call the police. He objects, and she does just that.<\/p>\n
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As she explains to them on the phone, her mother has advanced dementia and doesn\u2019t have the capacity to give sexual consent. They ask Amanda if she saw her struggling. \u201cShe doesn\u2019t resist because she doesn\u2019t know what\u2019s happening to her,\u201d she responds. And as the authorities get involved, so begins a chain of events shedding light on emotional ethical quandaries, and on a bureaucratic system doing its best under quite impossible circumstances. When SOIT (Sexual Offences Investigation Trained) officers decide to temporarily separate Martin and Leslie, Amanda objects. Leslie is completely dependent on Martin, she explains: \u201cHe loves her, dearly.\u201d<\/p>\n
This is a very upsetting film, an incisive investigation of a complex, thorny, and sorely human situation, in which binary offerings of what is morally right or wrong are not clear cut \u2013 how could they be, when even the person at the heart of it all may not know what they want? One of the most perplexing issues it explores is disinhibition, in which the person, because of the condition, runs on purely primal instincts. And they may well absolutely want sex with their partner. Should others be able to deny it of them \u2013 definitively, indefinitely \u2013 because they may not knowingly be consenting, even if they are initiating it? And who would make that decision? The family? The authorities? These are the sort of questions that Queen At Sea so admirably and desperately poses.<\/p>\n
There is an unflinching intimacy all round.<\/p>\n
Really though, despite the inciting incident driving the film, it is ultimately about so much more than that: it is about the unfathomable quagmire of dementia. \u201cI don\u2019t know what\u2019s going on in there anymore. She\u2019s unreadable,\u201d says Amanda at one point. Leslie \u2013 played so delicately and, to be honest, frighteningly by Calder-Marshall \u2013 seems in a state of constant confusion. When asked questions by authorities, her eyes plead to her daughter for help. The film is such a sympathetic portrayal of the loss of agency, of independence, of integrity and often dignity, and of the collateral damage on family members. Binoche\u2019s Amanda is at her wit\u2019s end, trying her best to navigate something not necessarily navigable, wanting the best for her mum and also for her own daughter, the teenage Sara (Florence Hunt), whose adolescence is being dramatically impinged by what\u2019s happening.<\/p>\n
The stakes are compounded by American writer\/director Lance Hammer\u2019s filmmaking which, for the early stretch at least, presents proceedings in a cold, matter-of-fact and brutal style, fixed cameras passively observing what\u2019s happening. This creates a stark sense of unease, making the film feel intrusive and even voyeuristic, which is appropriate \u2013 this shouldn\u2019t be comfortable. It\u2019s a very effective approach from cinematographer Adolpho Veloso, who did such painterly work on last year\u2019s Train Dreams<\/a>.<\/p>\n There is an unflinching intimacy all round. A gynaecological examination. Amanda tenderly bathing her mother. The endless little heartbreaks. There\u2019s not a line of dialogue that doesn\u2019t seem like it\u2019s being thought for the first time, let alone said, via unshowy, underplayed but incredibly powerful performances. Calder-Marshall is 79, Courtenay is 89; both are quietly but profoundly affecting. Meanwhile, the smaller, supporting characters \u2013 police, doctors, social workers and care-home staff \u2013 feel uncannily real. As it turns out, there\u2019s a reason for that: in his efforts to make it all as accurate as possible, in terms of scenarios, terminology and even cadence, Hammer (who spent many years developing the film) consulted such staff and then asked them to appear on screen. The resulting authenticity makes for an even more confronting experience. (Also, if you know north London, Hammer captures Tufnell Park and Archway\u2019s leafy and somewhat drab suburban tones so vividly \u2013 it\u2019s shocking that it\u2019s taken an American to get this right.)<\/p>\n Everything is so naturalistic and convincing that when events suddenly ratchet up at the end, it feels somewhat at odds with everything that\u2019s come before \u2013 a bit of plot taking over from such a considered case study. A strand focusing on Amanda\u2019s daughter Sara, meanwhile, also contrasts with the matter at hand, as she embarks on her own romantic pursuits. It\u2019s a bittersweet reflection of where her grandmother finds herself, the world opening up for Sara, young love in full bloom, but feels like a nice conceit rather than a vital piece of the film. Still, among all the bleakness, its sweetness and warmth provide a welcome counterpoint, and a relief.<\/p>\n Humanity is key to Queen At Sea, which highlights some very knotty politics, illustrating that the system surrounding cases like Leslie\u2019s can overwhelm and \u2013 despite the best wills in the world \u2013 dehumanise. For the most part, this film has a gentle touch, and you feel its despair throughout as it weighs it all up, posing difficult questions and not presuming to have any answers. It\u2019s about the utter tragedy of dementia, about these poor people who have lost themselves, and the family members who have lost a substantial part of them. It\u2019s a sad, sad film. You should see it.<\/p>\n Appropriately and unavoidably bleak, and keenly understated, this is nevertheless a quietly enthralling piece of cinema, grappling with dementia both morally and mentally. Despairing, hugely compassionate work.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"When the police are called regarding a situation involving an elderly couple, dementia and consent, the family at…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":352275,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[37],"tags":[9,24,63,122,124,123],"class_list":["post-352274","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-queens","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-nyc","tag-queens","tag-queens-headlines","tag-queens-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/352274","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=352274"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/352274\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/352275"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=352274"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=352274"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=352274"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Queen](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/queen-at-sea-3.jpg\"\/)
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