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Clement Virgo has built a reputation as one of Canada’s most distinctive storytellers, adept at blending the intimate with the operatic. Following his acclaimed TIFF 2022 feature Brother,  which we featured here on BGN, his story was a lyrical exploration of family and grief. Virgo returns with Steal Away, a film that slides between fairy tale, gothic melodrama, and psychological horror. It’s a bold, shape-shifting work that resists easy categorization, sustained by commanding performances from Mallori Johnson and Angourie Rice.

Set largely within the confines of a stately mansion, Steal Away hinges on the unlikely relationship between two young women. Johnson (Kindred) stars as Cécile, a resourceful daughter seeking refuge along with her mother. The matriarch of the wealthy estate who takes them in is Florence (Lauren Lee Smith), a noted humanitarian with a history of sheltering immigrants. Their temporary sanctuary is the estate of Fanny (Rice), a privileged young woman whose sheltered upbringing has left her with little exposure to the outside world.

Virgo approaches their initial encounters with the heightened sensibility of a fable. The contrasts are clear: wealth and poverty, naiveté and experience, stability and displacement. Yet as the narrative unfolds, the film undermines its own binary oppositions. What first appears pristine, Fanny’s manicured home and her carefully maintained innocence: gradually reveals itself as fragile, unstable, and corrupt at its core. The mansion becomes less a sanctuary than a gilded trap, its elegance concealing rot beneath the surface.

Not everything is as it seems, as each of the players within this enigmatic ensemble piece have their own private agenda, and as the viewer, we eventually find out it gets progressively dark.

Johnson delivers a quietly riveting performance as Cécile, grounding the film with a sense of lived experience and emotional authenticity. Rice, meanwhile, brings an ambivalent complexity to Fanny, oscillating between disarming charm and an undercurrent of menace. Their chemistry lends the film its emotional stakes, their bond both a source of fragile comfort and a conduit for danger. 

During a pristine party held at the estate, Fanny, dressed like a baby doll, begins to menstruate. The blood has seeped through her Cinderella-like dress, and this moment serves as metaphor, in my opinion for what this film is about. The blood serves as something darker underneath that has broken the surface. Now exposed, Fanny has to cover the blood that has stained her dress. There are stains of the past that have been covered up by deep dark family secrets, and the film further explores how inevitably those secrets will bleed out.

While Steal Away is steeped in atmosphere, Virgo and his cinematographer Sophie Winqvist luxuriate in gorgeous contrasts, red and blue hues giving way to stark shadow. Its power lies not in jump scares or overt spectacle, but in the steady erosion of certainty. Identities shift, motives blur, and the story spirals into a disorienting psychological terrain that recalls the gothic tradition as much as contemporary elevated horror.

There’s also something to be said about Cécile’s look in the film. In contrast against the backdrop of Fanny and her family’s wealth, Cécile looks more polished. More regal. It’s as if she is the one with wealth and privilege. Fanny sees this and yearns for every bit of it. She wants to style her hair the same as  Cécile’s, she wants to wear the clothes she wears. But Fanny’s admiration for Cécile goes beyond appearance. As Cécile becomes romantically involved with a local boy named Rufus (Idrissa Sanogo), who works on the grounds of their estate (almost like a plantation) she wants him too. Yes, there are some heavy Antebellum-vibes happening at this white-owned estate maintained by Black groundskeepers. 

The film could be classified into many genres. Virgo’s choice to resist easy classification may frustrate some viewers, particularly those seeking the linear clarity of a traditional thriller. Yet for audiences attuned to ambiguity, the film’s refusal to settle into romance, horror, or domestic drama becomes its greatest strength. By the conclusion, Steal Away feels less like a straightforward narrative than an immersion into a feverish, unsettling dream.

With Steal Away, Virgo confirms his willingness to push beyond conventional boundaries, crafting a film that is as visually intoxicating as it is thematically slippery. It may polarize, but its ambition and artistry solidify Virgo’s place among contemporary filmmakers unafraid to traverse the shadowy border between beauty and dread.

Steal Away premiered at the 2025 Toronto International Film Festival.

The post TIFF 2025 Review: Clement Virgo Delivers a Genre-Bending Fable of Desire and Deception in ‘Steal Away’ appeared first on Black Girl Nerds.