The career path of Paul Schrader is an illustrative example of rise, fall from grace and redemption narrative structure. He established himself first as the talented scriptwriter, then as the potent filmmaker, enjoyed success during the Eighties and Nineties, after which he fell from the grace of Hollywood studios in the new millennium. The decade and half between Auto Focus (2002) and First Reformed (2017) was pretty tough for Schrader, as it was marked by disagreements with the producers, projects being taken away from him and re-cut and troubles financing his other films.

Almost miraculously, the filmmaker went back to his roots and re-emerged as the great auteur with his loosely connected (anti-)Calvinist trilogy consisting of First Reformed, The Card Counter (2021) and Master Gardener (2022). But after the underwhelming Oh Canada (premiered earlier this year at Cannes and caught at Sarajevo Film Festival where Schrader presided over the...