SECRETS AND LIES Movie Review
Hortense (Marianne Jean-Baptiste) is an optometrist who decides to seek information about her birth mother when her beloved adoptive mother dies. She discovers that she was born to Cynthia (Brenda Blethyn), an anxious and unhappy middle-aged single mother who is different from Hortense in many ways, perhaps the least of which is the color of her skin. Director Mike Leigh's splendid, involving, and generous-spirited Secrets and Lies was the deserving Grand Prize Winner at the 1996 Cannes Film Festival, and Brenda Blethyn was the just-as-deserving winner of the Festival's Best Actress Award. Her towering performance is but one element in Leigh's brilliantly cast and eloquently written intimate epic about repressed jealousies and family secrets, which features sterling work from Phyllis Logan, Claire Rushbrook, and in particular, Leigh veteran Timothy Spall (Life Is Sweet). If there's a flaw, it can be found in a too-pat speech near the end that plays more like a defense attorney's summation than the spontaneous outburst it purports to be (though Spall almost brings it off entirely). And while the picture's overall shape seems a bit neater than some of Leigh's earlier work, these are minor quibbles over an overall achievement of enormous power, grace, and intelligence.
NEXT STOP … High Hopes, Life Is Sweet, Career Girls
1995 (R) 142m/C GB Brenda Blethyn, Marianne Jean-Baptiste, Timothy Spall, Claire Rushbrook, Phyllis Logan, Lee Ross, Ron Cook, Leslie Manville, Irene Handl; Cameos: Alison Steadman; D: Mike Leigh; W: Mike Leigh; C: Dick Pope; M: Andrew Dickson. Australian Film Institute ‘97: Best Foreign Film; British Academy Awards ‘96: Best Actress (Blethyn), Best Original Screenplay; Cannes Film Festival ‘96: Best Actress (Blethyn), Best Film; Golden Globe Awards ‘97: Best Actress—Drama (Blethyn); Los Angeles Film Critics Association Awards ‘96: Best Actress (Blethyn), Best Director (Leigh), Best Film; Nominations: Academy Awards ‘96: Best Actress (Blethyn), Best Director (Leigh), Best Original Screenplay, Best Picture, Best Supporting Actress (Jean-Baptiste); British Academy Awards ‘96: Best Actor (Spall), Best Director (Leigh), Best Film, Best Supporting Actress (Jean-Baptiste); Cesar Awards ‘97: Best Foreign Film; Directors Guild of America Awards ‘96: Best Director (Leigh); Golden Globe Awards ‘97: Best Film—Drama, Best Supporting Actress (Jean-Baptiste); Independent Spirit Awards ‘97: Best Foreign Film; Screen Actors Guild Award ‘96: Best Actress (Blethyn); Writers Guild of America ‘96: Best Original Screenplay. VHS FXV