I just finished watching this film and came here to read what other people thought about it. I was left with several impressions, perhaps the first being an echo of what's been written in other reviews which is that Elisabeth Moss's performance is stunning. She's a very interesting actress to me, in that her looks are not conventionally pretty and yet she has an awesome face because of the emotion she's able to convey through it. She strikes me as someone I would like to know, and that's not something I experience often. There is something so human and compassionate about her. But now I'm not sure how much of this is her and how much is the role she played here.
Throughout much of this film I was almost eager for it to be over. It is slow, with many long shots of both the two main characters, and inanimate things such as stairs, paintings, and the lake. I especially like what another reviewer said which was something like the script and plot of this film are in the drama genre, whereas the setting, and music are like a horror film. (Sorry for the paraphrasing.) There was such an underlying tension throughout, which I'm sure was intended. I'm not so sure whether the confusion I felt throughout much of it was also intended. For example, I couldn't really understand the relationship between Moss's character and that of Katherine Waterston's. There seemed to be so little good feeling between them, that it was hard to understand why they were even spending time together, beside it being their annual ritual.
In the end, and this is the kind of film I feel the need to see again, I'd say it was really about a woman's descent into madness. Through the flashbacks we learn that Catherine (Moss) had some problems before the death of her father, but that during the week that the film depicts, she unravels, and gets "worse" every day, that is, more paranoid, manic, and depressed. The ending was also ambiguous; she has gone, but the question of where, lingers. Did she ultimately jump into the lake and commit suicide like her father, or did she get herself together and leave a bad situation. I wonder if anyone besides the writer and director knows.
If you're into psychological films, films about madness, or just enjoy watching great acting, definitely catch Queen of Earth.
