MM Shorts – Sister Wives

Released: 2024 (Available to stream now on Channel 4)

Director: Louisa Connolly-Burnham

Starring: Louisa Connolly-Burnham, Mia McKenna-Bruce, Michael Fox

The steady opening camera tilt downwards of Kaidence’s (Louisa Connolly-Burnham) tightly braided hair. A stark visual nod to the rigid environment in which she is not thriving, but merely surviving her current twisted circumstances. This needless normalisation and extension of men’s abuse of power, many unshaken in how their disturbing actions appear. ‘We are to become three’. ‘All my brothers have!’ you hear Jeremiah (Michael Fox) cry.

In a climate that still seems worryingly susceptible to a wealth of regressive toxic masculinity, consider Louisa Connolly-Burnham’s ‘Sister Wives’ a quietly defiant, ultimately hopeful statement that life and love only progress, when we are free to let our hair down.

A much-deserved winner of Best British Short back at Iris Prize and now featuring on the 2025 EE BAFTA’s British Short Film longlist. Immediately you sense Kaidence and Jeremiah’s poor excuse of a relationship is hanging by a thread. Struggling to conceive, enter Mia McKenna Bruce’s courteous new arrival Galilee to test the steely resolve of her fellow sister wife. And yet these women find unity and share unlikely moments of joy that gradually break down their respective defences, only heightening their external inquisitive nature but also their internal fondness for one another.

Rather like Galilee’s trustee Nokia 3310, these fleeting flourishes of freedom push all the right buttons. When their own Snake in Jeremiah is presented with a major opportunity further afield by the church. They seize the moment in leaning into such feelings, both softening despite the harsh surroundings they have been forced to acclimatise to. Jeremiah may have turned his gaze elsewhere, but within such an observant community it takes frightfully little for suspicions to form, leaving Kaidence and Galilee no choice in plotting an audacious escape.

A world that’s alarming in its sense of confinement. Yet how director/star Louisa Connolly-Burnham populates it, from its decor (production designer Harrison Clark) to costume design (Constance Woods). Sister Wives is bursting at the seams with impeccable details which only reinforce its timely themes.

The traditional, taut baby blue and pink dress code often associated with conceiving a child. Contrasting with the ‘censorship’ of a bright red dress in an attempt to nullify a woman’s own sexual desires, further complimented by the banishing of select literature. The clinical, somewhat amusing phallic symbolism of an aubergine being sliced, after an underwhelming consummation. A mere flicker of a candle on a dinner table Kaidence and Jeremiah share that desperately needs putting out, only to have the sun beaming in those precious outdoor exchanges with Galilee. Defying its modest runtime. The film does an outstanding job in carefully immersing you in this oppressive and chilling environment, that feels truly lived-in.

Retaining a morsel of control within her simmering rage towards the domineering Jeremiah, who dims her world view. Only for her inner light to be slowly dialled up, in the presence of Galilee. In front of the camera, Louisa Connolly-Burnham exquisitely captures the sheer complexities in how Kaidence has to navigate this dysfunctional arrangement, alongside her own burgeoning queerness. Aiding that process is a wonderfully drawn performance by Mia Mckenna-Bruce as Galilee, whose both vitality and vulnerability around Kaidence makes for a truly magnetic pairing. Meanwhile Michael Fox’s screentime as Jeremiah may be limited, but the sheer calmness in how he articulates his repressive thoughts to manipulate these women, genuinely unsettles.

Culminating in a euphoric ending that particularly in this context and time period, remains refreshing for queer cinema. Mirroring a lovely capture of a flock of birds as a new day dawns. You will be rooting for these ‘Sister Wives’ to fly the nest and spread their wings every step of the way.