Cate Blanchett is a nun who runs an orphanage in 'The New Boy'

This is another one of the films that came to fruition during the pandemic, where the period of lockdowns prompted many directors and screenwriters to revisit their forgotten or paused projects. Australian director Warwick Thronton had wanted to bring his negative experience as a student in a Catholic boarding school to the screen and had already written a part of the script. Australian actress Cate Blanchett became aware of the project during the Covid-19 times and offered to help develop the story further and join as a co-producer, eventually assuming the lead role of Sister Eileen.

"The New Boy" premiered in the "Un Certain Regard" section of the 2023 Cannes Film Festival.

The film is described as a spiritual and survival drama set in the 1940s, following the story of a 9-year-old orphaned Aboriginal boy who appears in the middle of the night at a monastery run by Sister Eileen. His arrival disturbs the balance of the place, as the young boy has a special aura and unusual powers. As the relationship between the nun and the boy grows closer, the religious environment begins to crumble.

The film, set in a Christian setting, is not intended to address sexual abuse or harassment, as some of the audience might assume. That is not the story they want to tell, according to Blanchett and the director. They mentioned that the story has changed significantly from how it was conceived 18 years ago when the central character was originally a kind-hearted priest with some doubts about his faith. These doubts were transferred to the main character of Sister Eileen, who is spiritually lost in her life, as explained by the actress: "Sister Eileen is quite spiritually lost in her life, so I think it generates an interesting dynamic with a child whose abilities or capabilities and ultimate destiny are unknown." As an Aboriginal child and while adapting to the orphanage, the boy is allowed to roam the monastery spaces shirtless, eat with his hands, and sleep under his bed. With this film, Blanchett has returned to filming in the southern part of her country, just as she did at the beginning of her career in 1996 with "Parkland."

Warwick Thornton returned to the Cannes Film Festival after winning the Caméra d'Or in 2009 for his debut feature "Samson and Delilah," which also featured two Aboriginal protagonists, a pair of teenagers who escape their community to go to the big city. Similar to this new production, his first feature was screened in the "Un Certain Regard" category.

For the Cannes festival, "The New Boy" is "a mystical story that evokes the director's own experience. At the instigation of his mother, he lived until the age of thirteen in one of the few monastic cities in Australia, in the west of the country. In this institution run by Spanish nuns, this boy, who had never set foot in a church before, was deeply moved by the image of Christ on the cross, an image so different from everything he had known as a child and so far removed from his Aboriginal heritage. The plot of the film revolves around this profound question: Can two opposing spiritualities be reconciled?"

After its festival run, the film will be released in Australian cinemas starting tomorrow.

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