Sofia Coppola’s latest film pits Nicole Kidman and Colin Farrell in a Civil War-era battle of wits.

The Beguiled, an adaptation of Thomas P. Cullinan’s novel of the same name, unfolds in 1863 as the American Civil War curdles in its third year.

It is set in a girl’s boarding school in Virginia, a sphere of carefully protected femininity kept largely isolated from the violent conflict rocking the country. The school’s buttoned-up routine is interrupted, however, when the women secretly take an injured enemy soldier (Farrell) into their care.

As they grant him refuge and tend to his wounds, the school simmers over with repressed desires and sexual tension, enmeshing the school’s headmistress (Kidman) and the girls under her care in volatile rivalries.

The story has already been adapted for the screen before, in a 1971 version directed by Don Siegel and starring Clint Eastwood. Coppola, however, makes the film entirely her own, paring away all but the most essential elements of the story, leaving a film where emotion and character are conveyed subtly through shifts in facial expressions, quiet glances and changes in the light.

The Beguiled is being screened at St James Cavalier, Valletta, tomorrow at 8.30pm. Tickets may be obtained at http://ticketenginex.kreattivita.org .