Deux sœurs

Final review of 2024!

"I don't understand you, but I love you."

Hard Truths is a welcoming return from legendary filmmaker/writer Mike Leigh.

I have no idea why this film was rejected from other festivals like Cannes and Venice because this was great. It is a depressing character piece where certain things in our past are left unresolved, and the unspoken hurt still picks away at us. Mental health issues are not just sadness and quietness but anger as well.

We follow Pansy, whose first-ever scene is her springing to wake after having a terrible dream, and from there, she is in a constant state of rage at pretty much everything. The littlest things can set her off into a rant. Her words/insults range from hilariously creative to having some truth to what she is complaining about. It mostly has to do with how people talk to her, with one example of a scene in a parking lot when another driver starts an altercation after rudely asking if she is leaving her parked space.

How about another scene where she goes to the dentist, and the woman doing the treatment talks to her in a manner that is not meant to be disrespectful and tries to ease the patient with friendliness during the process but can be seen as being treated/talked to like a child. Even Pansy says, "Don't talk to me like a child!"

But this is not a simple case of waking up cranky or having a bad day. It is something more than that. Judging by her family life, with her husband and son, they are all miserable, most noticeably her son and husband, who carry this heavy silence and hardly make eye contact. There is no love or comfort in the house.

On the other hand, Pansy's sister lives the opposite life; she is happier and has a healthy relationship with her children. Even her flat is more vibrant in colour and feels more inviting.

Marianne Jean-Baptiste is terrific here, and what could have easily been a one-note performance is, instead, a devastating but exhausting performance of a woman who needs a lot of help. But she is still someone you want to avoid if you are in close contact. Even her angry outburst tires her out.

It is a very human film with beautiful writing and acting. The film shows the sad reality of how our mental health can isolate us from other people, even our own family. There is no concrete answer to why Pansy is like this. There are little crumbs of a backstory, but it is left open-ended. Situations like this are like the ocean: it is much deeper than it looks. The cinematography from Dick Pope (RIP) is subtle and nothing too flashy.

This movie and another film I saw at this festival, A Real Pain, almost feel similar in terms of a complicated family dynamic and the different lives the characters lead, where one is happier than the other.

Overall rating: The ultimate feel-bad movie of 2024.

Well, 2024 is done and dusted. I hope you all had a great year, and if not, I hope 2025 is better for you. I will see you there. Take care, everyone!

This film incisively and truthfully illustrates the trials and tribulations of mental illness, in this case ostensibly depression, and how it affects the loved ones of those afflicted. It is heartfelt, at times hilarious, and thought-provoking.

Marianne Jean-Baptiste as Pansy, a fitting name as she gives a vivid flowery performance, like the real-life eponymous flower, is excellent here at portraying a deeply troubled woman teetering on the brink of madness, hanging on by a thread. What could have easily fell into a caricature performance is the exact opposite: she feels so real, raw, and visceral, riding the line between sanity and insanity. She is at war with the world: the most normal petty inconveniences cause her to explode into hysterics, rage, and deep sadness; her reactions are sometimes so severe to the point she's at times unable to merely leave her bed. Michele Austin is great, playing Chantelle, the foil and sister to the lead. Where Pansy seems to be unhappy and unsuccessful, Chantelle is the opposite. Despite their differences, they support one another. And it's their sisterhood and camaraderie that functions as the film's anchor and centerpiece. The implication of their sisterhood is to drive home the point that family is key in life, a balm for the spirit. An interesting thing happens as the film furthers: the more time Pansy spends with her family, the more irritated she becomes, but it's also the more open she becomes about her feelings; it's as though her family simultaneously causes her to not only face her issues head-on, but face the reality that she does indeed have a good support network, but often fails to take advantage of it. This brings to the film an interesting dynamic. It's in these scenes with her family, particularly with her sister, that she finally lets down her tough, gruff exterior to betray a soft, mushy interior.

The film, despite at its core being a darker and moving subject matter, has many moments of welcome levity and playfulness. The comedy and gravitas meld flawlessly to make for both touching and funny viewing. The only issue this film has is that the pacing unfortunately drags rather often. As there is no real, significant plot here, besides following a middle-aged woman struggling mentally and existentially, the film feels very slice-of-life; the scenes unfurl with almost no change between when we first start the film to when we finish it. This is compounded by the dense dialogue and the secondary stories not really adding up to much ultimately, albeit the supporting characters are all good. But that is likely the conceit here: it ought to be about illustrating a snapshot of this character. Despite recognizing her issues, Pansy very well may never get better and things likely will always look this way, unfortunately similar to how life itself is for many with mental illness.

Overall, this is a great film. It's poignant, with a powerhouse central performance, unexpectedly and serendipitously humorous and diverting, and it provides a verisimilar portrait of dealing with mental illness.

Was this a good film? Yes. Did I like it? I'm not quite sure 'like' is the right word. There are parts which are comedic, where you feel like you shouldn't be laughing but can't help it because of the outrageous things that our protagonist Pansy spits out. But as the film goes on it becomes quite sad, like damn this is their everyday life and it's exhausting! It becomes exhausting for us too as viewers as we follow Pansy's day-to-day and witness conflict after conflict in every interaction she has. This is reinforced by the slow pace and lingering shots as we experience the characters' worlds in such painful detail. The acting is so good that makes it feel so real, almost as if I was watching a fly-on-the-wall documentary. Overall worth the watch. A reminder that you never know what is going on in others' lives..

I was one of the few who felt that Leigh's films Mr. Turner and Peterloo represented the best in his career in cinema. He finally had a high budget and his artistic craft met them perfectly. Hard Truths is a step back from this scale back into the social dramas he used to make, although this feels totally new for him at the same time. If you have a dark sense of humor, you will find it extremely funny when she is nasty and yelling at everyone. They put her in one environment after another, almost like Mr Bean but she causes mayhem everywhere she goes. The furniture store, the doctor, the grocery store. I loved these scenes because the fouler she gets, the funnier the movie becomes. It is such a simple and ingenious idea. Yet outside of these comic vignettes, the film is extremely bitter. It is so well acted and well staged. The supporting characters around her bring the depth in their reaction against her forming a film where we are drawing our own meaning. It is another solid classic in his filmography that I will revisit.

Mike Leigh's Secrets and Lies was a brilliant film and his latest film Hard Truths is just as brilliant and stars the same actor Marianne Jean-Baptiste as the unforgettable, Pansy. Hard Truths is funny, heart-warming, sad, but most of all, very human. There's never a false note, the characters are so beautifully written and performed and I can't wait to see all the nominations Marianne is going to get for this role. It's definitely a film that will make you laugh out loud and cry, and you may not like Pansy but you will still enjoy every minute you're with her. See Hard Truths as soon as possible.