While it may not be particularly memorable in retrospect, there was a brief moment when many of us believed that Una would become one of the major dramas of the past decade. In terms of the premise, the film was an adaptation of Blackbird, a critically acclaimed stage play by David Harrower, which told the story of a young, broken woman confronting the older man with whom she had a torrid relationship during her teenage years, her intention of meeting with him over a decade later being to address the psychological wounds she has suffered since their relationship abruptly ended, and he was sent off to prison for engaging in an affair with a minor. At the time, it seemed like it would be a major achievement – it starred Rooney Mara at her peak and was yet another entry into the steadily growing career of Ben Mendelsohn, who had only recently been “discovered” by the global audience. Yet despite the promise, Una is a film that has seemingly disappeared from our consciousness. This small-scale drama has appeared to hold a limited cultural cache – and while this is understandable since it’s not always the most consistent film, it does not deserve to be almost entirely forgotten. After all, it’s a simple and effective psychological thriller that dives deep into the minds of two very different characters as they come into close contact once again, forced to reconcile their past experiences, since their method of trying to move past these unfortunate events has done very little to soothe their souls and keep the demons at bay. Benedict Andrews, in his directorial debut, shows great prowess, taking the original play and carefully translating it to the screen, resulting in a solid and consistently engaging drama that may be uncomfortable, but in a way that is enthralling and always deeply meaningful.

Una is a film that dares to ask difficult questions – and considering the subject matter, it is navigating some very harsh territory. There’s a fine line between being a provocative drama that gives context to a relationship built on illicit desires, and a humanizing portrait of a sexual offender, but the film works through these challenges well, rarely veering too far towards either overt cynicism or complete compassion. This is essentially the primary intention behind the film, where its success relies on its ability to provoke and unsettle, while still showing some empathy, if not for the characters themselves, the people they represent. While it can be slightly heavy-handed at times, the film does well in making sure it is relatively authentic, never going too far in how it portrays these two central figures. Both Una and Ray are fascinating individuals, but they are by all accounts both incredibly despicable individuals. One of them was a young woman who had been driven to the point of hatred because of what she knew was a scorned romance, and the other was someone who didn’t have the self-control to prevent his desires from surfacing, permanently tainting him with the status of being a sexual offender, based solely on the fact that he could not realize that his urges were far from natural. It’s a fascinating character study that can often be extremely difficult to watch, especially in the moments where it seems to be giving a platform to a convicted paedophile, where he is given the chance to explain his actions and justify them – but smartly (and logically), the film never once lets him off the hook, just like it never presents the character of Una, who may be manipulative and hysterical, as too much of a villain either, rather positioning her as a disturbed young woman who blames the past for her current psychological state, and where the only way she can overcome it is through confrontation.

The nature of the film doesn’t place blame on one or the other – it shows how the relationship was copacetic and mutual, while actively avoiding getting too deep into the legality of the situation, which forms the foundation of the film, rather than the overt driving factor behind the storyline, which is much more invested in getting to know these characters and their varying psychological quandaries. Despite what it may seem to be based on a surface-level glance, Una is not merely the conventional “two people talk in a room” story, which is often a common trope in stage-to-screen adaptations. While it is very much a dialogue-driven film between the two major characters (and a few peripheral individuals placed into the film in the process of adapting it to film, to expand the world and make it more cinematic), there is a nuance to what Andrews is doing here. The original play was acclaimed not only because of the striking and unsettling conversation conducted between these two characters but also the eerie silences between sentences, something that the director effectively transfers to this film, mainly through the approach of using carefully placed flashbacks (which are either the most effective merit or most dreadful cliche for filmmakers who utilize this narrative tool). This is where Una manages to be the most profound, the quieter moments saying more than any of the words spoken by these characters. The entire purpose of this film is that it is an extended conversation between two people who come together after being separated for years, having seemingly exited the other’s life permanently – and the words they say may be passionate, but they’re empty since there is a simmering rage beneath both of them that only manifests in between these moments.

Credit must be given where it is due, and while it may not be the definitive work that it was supposed to be in terms of their career, Una contains excellent performances by both Rooney Mara and Ben Mendelsohn, two actors with wildly different styles and approaches to their acting methods, but which work together in terms of this film. Mara was coming off a few very promising years – her work in The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo and Carol cemented her as one of the most interesting actresses of her generation, and this film was designed to be a vehicle for her talents, a chance for her to take centre-stage and deliver a spirited, complex performance that paid tribute to her unique gifts as an actress. She does exceptionally well, and while it may not reach the peak of some of her other work, she’s delivering a solid and unforgettable performance as a young woman seeking answers, not necessarily to find closure, but rather as a means of getting revenge on the man who inflicted her with indelible psychological trauma. Across the proverbial (and literal) table sits Ben Mendelsohn, who was undergoing a career re-evaluation, going from the embodiment of the quintessential larrikin in Australian cinema to one of the most reliable character actors working today. While most of his more popular work sees him playing maniacal, cruel villains, Una places him in a position of playing a different kind of antagonist, a man whose biggest enemy is himself, and whose most significant challenges have always been overcoming his internal demons. As mentioned previously, Una is about how despicable people can warrant in-depth character studies, and both characters at the heart of this film certainly do match this criteria, and the actors successfully manage to grapple with the very thin boundary between the two with incredible prowess that proves how gifted they are, and that their place in the contemporary cinematic landscape is well-earned.

Una is not a particularly popular film, nor is it all that well-known outside of those who are interested in the careers of the two actors at the heart of the story. However, while its brief moment of success may have been fleeting, it remains one of the most shocking and provocative pieces of cinema in recent years, a deeply disturbing and wildly callous glimpse into the lives of two fascinating but imperfect characters who have already struggled to navigate the world after a traumatic event that caused both of them to gain indelible qualities that have made life difficult. Andrews deserves credit for managing to take as simple a play as this and turn it into something as rivetting as this, as does Harrower himself, who seems to be perfectly capable of taking his play and writing a screenplay adaptation that expands the world in which it takes place but without losing any of the meaning that comes in the more intimate moments that are carried over from the stage. There’s a nuance and complexity to this film that is difficult to describe – it mostly comes through the mounting tensions, where we are placed in this situation as passive observers, looking into this heated conversation with almost voyeuristic curiosity, as each sordid detail is revealed, setting off a new chain of confrontational moments. It’s difficult to watch, and it can sometimes traverse subject matter that is perhaps best left unprovoked, in fears that some may feel as if it is excusing the behaviour of the perverted older man, or condoning the forthright and vicious nature of his victim, who approaches him in a way that has its ethical problems attached to it. Navigating this world with poise and earnest sincerity, Una is a tremendously moving film that asks major questions but understands that it may not always be able to answer them, at least not in a way that would be all that satisfying, since real resolution isn’t often found, especially not in instances where one’s entire livelihood has been called into question.