Parents' Guide to Wildcat

Largely nonlinear, this fine depiction of a great author avoids typical biopic trappings, instead concentrating on the rhythms of the artistic process and capturing O'Connor's voice in a visual way. Directed by Ethan Hawke (father of star Maya Hawke), Wildcat doesn't do much to introduce O'Connor to viewers who aren't already familiar with her. In other words, it doesn't deal with ordinary biographical details: how she published her first story, etc. Instead, it zeroes in on her two most important relationships, those with professor Cal and her mother, and on the period in which she worked to finish her first novel (which also coincided with her lupus diagnosis).

Ethan Hawke seems most interested in how O'Connor's brain works, observing her in conversation, both with other literary thinkers and with her family, and especially—in a powerful sequence—speaking with a priest (a great Liam Neeson). Perhaps being an author himself and having published several novels, Hawke is more intimate with the creative process. When Flannery writes, the stories come to life on the screen, sometimes slyly, unexpectedly, with Hawke and Linney playing the characters in them. Through these mini-movies, we get even more of an idea of O'Connor's voice, her concerns, and her prose. (The movie also opens with a fun trailer for a fictional black-and-white movie adapted from one of O'Connor's stories.) Wildcat isn't a straightforward movie, and it may be more challenging than most biopics, but its admirable achievement is that it depicts who O'Connor was rather than merely what she did.