Sunday, 1 September 2019

VOD: Can You Ever Forgive Me? (dir: Marielle Heller, 2019)

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"Jack, this was not unpleasant."

The story of literary forger Lee Israel here plays like an anti-Woody Allen in its bitter-sweet portrayal of the New York artistic community, but still set against a filmic backdrop of the city.   The script is intelligent, the direction is carefully controlled and the tone is wonderfully sombre.  It is always a pleasure to see Melissa McCarthy swap broad-strokes comedy for understated finely-detailed dramatic performance, and her pairing with Richard E. Grant as her partner-in-crime here works superbly.  This is not a showy or attention-grabbing film, but it is engaging and pleasingly presented.

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