Secrets & Lies

British filmmaker Mike Leigh has a reputation as a curmudgeon. But his films reveal a keen interest in ordinary people, and of course so do his methods (which involve intensive workshopping with his actors). This is complicated by his predisposition for mockery. His inclines to comedy, and often trucks in caricature. What makes his work fascinating is how caricature does not preculde compassion.

Secrets & Lies won the Palme d’Or at Cannes in 1996, and also the Best Actress award for Brenda Blethyn. She plays Cynthia, a sad, anxious middle-aged working class white woman who is contacted out of the blue by Hortense (Marianne Jean-Baptiste), the baby she gave up for adoption 27 years earlier. But Hortense is Black. Surely there has been some mistake? While Leigh mines the colour issue for gentle comedy of manners, the film’s real interest is in Cynthia’s domestic and family life, which Hortense’s arrival allows her to see with new, cruel clarity (Hortense is an optometrist, after all). It’s an emotional work out, this film. Bring tissues.

Staff Pick: Savannah

A film of extraordinary emotional riches. Spellbinding.

Geoff Andrew, Time Out

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