After barely surviving a mandatory shutdown in response to the Coronavirus pandemic, the executive class running some of the largest film studios in the world decided that they weren’t quite ridiculously rich enough yet and furthermore they hadn’t taken enough liberties – financial, creative and moral – with those employed by them.

And so the actors and writers collectively said no and downed tools for five months in a dispute over pay (including residual payments in the age of streaming), working conditions, and especially the increasing threat of artificial intelligence being used to not only write screenplays based on algorithms but to steal the likenesses of actors (living and dead) and store them in perpetuity without just compensation.

With Hollywood productions quiet for half the year and none of the “talent” allowed to promote those movies that were completed prior to the strikes, we ended up with a more limited and less enthusiastically received slate of major releases. Not even superhero movies or franchise sequels fronted by Harrison Ford and Tom Cruise were guaranteed hits anymore.

Despite all this, 2023 ended up being a pretty good year for cinema, with plenty of examples of not only memorable blockbusters but of distinct filmmakers leaving their mark and under-represented communities providing vibrancy and freshness to a myriad of new stories. Based upon UK release dates, these are my 10 Best Films of 2023.

Follow me @SSPThinksFilm on X (Twitter).

10. You Are So Not Invited to My Bat Mitzvah

You Are So Not Invited to My Bat Mitzvah Review

2023 has been a great year for films about how Gen-Z processes their major life experiences, and this delightful, hilarious little film starring most of the Sandler clan (including Adam as an adorably schlubby dad) is up there with the very best.

As she approaches her her 13th birthday and the Jewish coming-of-age ritual, Stacy Friedman (Sunny Sandler) is determined to make her Bat Mitzvah the most perfect and memorable of her peer group, including that of BFF Lydia (Samantha Lorraine). But things get a lot more complicated as hormones, teenage crushes and petty but damaging psychological manipulation via social media enter the mix.

Five years ago, Bo Burnham made his memorable feature debut with Eighth Grade and told one of the most connective, visceral stories about becoming a teenager in years. Sammi Cohen’s film has the same aim but demonstrates how seismically culture has changed in just half a decade, all through a Jewish cultural lens. There may have never been a more challenging time to be growing up in an always-online age, and Alison Peck’s insightful script in addition to the across-the-board wonderfully naturalistic performances help to make this an unexpectedly profound crowd-pleaser.

9. Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 3

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 3 Review

#JusticeforJamesGunn incarnate, the final chapter of the unlikeliest a-hole superhero team’s story shatters expectations and satisfyingly delivers on almost every level.

After years of defending the countless worlds together, the Guardians team has reached a precarious place. Their leader Peter Quill (Chris Pratt) has slumped into a depressed, alcoholic stupor after losing the love of his life Gamora (Zoe Saldaña), and Rocket’s (Bradley Cooper) past as a bio-engineered test subject comes back to haunt him in a very real way. Can the team come together one last time and save the galaxy, and themselves?

Marvel is seen as a pretty risk-averse studio and certainly much of their recent output has been received with a shrug from many viewers, but Guardians Vol 3 shows what happens when one of the best directors they partnered with is left to finish the story he wanted to tell. The action has never been more polished and visually dazzling, the performances from people and animated raccoons alike so honest and full of pain, Gunn’s love of animals so prominent as the team go up against a truly detestable figure who causes pain for the hell of it.

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He is famed for his organisational skills and rapid shooting pace on films which never run over time or over budget (usually while in the depths of post-production for one he is well on his way preparing for his next), not to mention racking over 100 varied producing credits with Scott Free Productions, the company he founded with his late fellow filmmaker brother Tony.

Throughout his directorial career Sir Ridley has displayed a fascination with exploring human nature and telling stories with complex and formidable women at their centre, and over a 45-plus year career he has tried his hand at most genres, always bringing distinct and atmospheric visual sensibilities with him.

How do you even begin to put such an impressive body of work in any kind of justifiable order? Well, we at The Film Magazine are certainly going to try. So put on your favourite Hans Zimmer soundtrack, draw the blinds to cast some interesting shadows, and turn on the smoke machine. Based on each film’s critical and audience reception, and their wider impacts on popular culture, here is Every Ridley Scott Directed Film Ranked from worst to best.

Follow @thefilmagazine on X (Twitter).

28. The Counsellor (2013)

In an effort to buy himself out of trouble, a lawyer (Michael Fassbender) agrees to facilitate the theft of a Cartel drug shipment on behalf of local kingpin Reiner (Javier Bardem).

Acclaimed novelist Cormac McCarthy writing a script for Ridley Scott sounds like a dream come true, yet The Counsellor was anything but. The characters are all broad strokes, amoral archetypes, or, in Bardem’s case, cartoon characters. No one changes or learns anything, and the smattering of kinky sex and splatter violence is transparently aiming for shock value.

By squandering an intriguing premise and an impressive cast, The Counsellor ends up as an amateurish, sleazy and boring crime film with, particularly disappointing for McCarthy (a writer famed for pristine penmanship), only a single memorable exchange of dialogue.

27. Exodus: Gods and Kings (2014)

A re-telling of the Old Testament story of Moses (Christian Bale), an adopted prince of the Pharaoh leading the Israelite rebellion and escape from their slave-masters in Egypt.

The animated The Prince of Egypt did this story so much better, or at least executed it in a more emotionally compelling way. Ridley Scott might be Mr Historical Epic, but in adapting a Biblical story he bit off more than he could chew.

Even putting aside the uncomfortable look of casting white Europeans and their descendants to populate a story of Egypt and the Middle East (this was only half a decade ago and everybody should’ve known better) Exodus never seems to work out exactly what it wants to be; grounded or fantastical, spiritual or cynical, faithful to the Old Testament or out to deconstruct it; it’s all of these and none of them at the same time.

26. Robin Hood (2010)

Returning from the Crusades, Robin Longstride (Russell Crowe in his fourth collaboration with Ridley Scott) leads a series of uprisings in the villages surrounding Nottingham in protest of the cruelty of the Crown’s treatment of the peasant classes.

Who decided Monsieur Hood should be gritty? Give me a fox or Errol Flynn any day.

This take on the classic English folk tale had all the action chops but never managed to present Robin as an engaging character with compelling or relatable struggles.

Crowe’s accent going on a walking tour of the British Isles was distracting to say the least, and while Mark Strong and Oscar Isaac are fun baddies to boo at, Cate Blanchett is largely wasted as a more active than usual Marian, the copious convoluted flashbacks only serving to muddy the characters and their struggles. 

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25. Someone to Watch Over Me (1987)

Newly-promoted NYPD detective Mike Keegan (Tom Berenger) is assigned to protect socialite Claire Gregory (Mimi Rogers) who has witnessed a brutal mob assassination, but finds himself helplessly falling for her.

This is a pretty dull, by-the-numbers noir-thriller enlivened only slightly by Scott’s usual visual flair and Lorraine Bracco’s sturdy supporting performance which manages to make the usually thankless role of cop’s wife fairly interesting.

You can predict every twist and plot turn coming at you a mile off, and all the late 80s fashion and hair is far more terrifying than any violent threats to the protagonists might be.

24. A Good Year (2006)

High-flying British stock trader Max Skinner (Russell Crowe) returns to his family vineyard in France to tie up his late uncle’s estate but falls in love with a simpler way of life and the people he connects with, chiefly waitress and childhood friend Fanny (Marion Cotillard).

Russell Crowe’s first reunion with Scott since Gladiator is a pretty strange beast, all things considered. It’s basically the story of a man with money being humbled, going on a trip down memory lane in summery rural France and trying to recall a more innocent point in his life when things other than wealth mattered to him.

For once Crowe isn’t playing a gruff macho man, he’s got good comic chemistry with Tom Hollander, and the flashbacks featuring Freddie Highmore and Albert Finney are admittedly rather poignant. Sadly Marion Cotillard doesn’t get much of interest to do despite being key to the plot, and Scott seems far less comfortable directing what is essentially a rom-com.

23. Hannibal (2001)

Hannibal Review

A decade after his escape from the asylum, Dr Hannibal Lecter (Anthony Hopkins) is being pursued not just by the FBI’s Clarice Starling (Julianne Moore) but one of his few surviving and highly vengeful victims (Gary Oldman).

It was an almost impossible task, to follow Jonathan Demme’s 1991 masterpiece adapting an inferior book sequel, but Scott did his best with what he was given. Anthony Hopkins has fun with a lot more screen time as Hannibal Lecter, and the whole thing is presented with handsome cinematography and a beautifully orchestrated score from Hans Zimmer, including a meticulous original aria for the sake of a single scene at the opera.

Unfortunately these iconic characters lose a lot of their power and allure, and the whole thing feels over-stuffed, unfocused and unnecessarily gory.

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Many horror fans are aware of two versions of House of Wax, the macabre Vincent Price film from the early 1950s and the far more questionable one with Paris Hilton from 2005, but some might not be aware that the former was already a remake.

A film from the endlessly versatile Michael Curtiz (who directed the similar horror Doctor X the year before, and most famously Casablanca), Mystery of the Wax Museum was released in 1933 and is most interesting as a record of the short-lived two-strip Technicolor process, now just a curious artefact of film history. Yet its basic plot – a brilliant artist running a failing wax museum who is horribly disfigured and driven mad in a fire set by his business partner – is what is largely replicated in House of Wax (1953). The second remake uses the wax museum setting for its final act but little else, telling a very different type of horror story.

Pre-Code movies (the self-censoring Motion Picture Production Code, A.K.A Hayes Code, that was brought in from 1934) had the potential to be much more gruesome and provocative than those released only a couple of years later, so it may take some by surprise how far a 1933 film is able to go in terms its imagery and themes. In addition to Lionel Atwill’s sculptor Ivan Igor (great horror name) being turned into a scarred killer, the plot also heavily incorporates grave robbery, post-mortem mutilation and substance abuse. 

Mystery of the Wax Museum was re-titled and remade for the first time as House of Wax two decades later, partly in order to capitalise on the latest hot filmmaking trend: 3-D. By the early 1950s, Vincent Price became the most recognisable American horror movie star on the back of this, which serves as a great vehicle for his unique theatrical grandstanding talents. The film, the first colour 3D release from one of the big studios, was directed by Andre DeToth, a longtime (and often uncredited) Hollywood screenwriter and second unit director who ironically could not see 3D himself due to visual impairment.

Both of the first two films hit more-or-less the same story beats with Igor (renamed as Jarrod in the 1953 film) being the under-appreciated Michelangelo of wax sculpture, dedicating everything to his wondrous recreations of iconic and important historical figures, and refusing to create more carnivalesque fare like depicting serial killers and scenes of grisly violence to bring in the punters. The earlier film has the sculptor fixated on his masterwork statue of Marie Antoinette and the latter is dedicated to his Joan of Arc, but both versions of the character find and become obsessed with women who appear to be uncanny real-life representations of their idols; women they want entomb in wax as the centrepieces of their latest art installations which are secretly made up of wax-covered corpses snatched from the morgue.

House of Wax transposed the original contemporary 1930s story to an early 1900s setting to give the filmmakers an opportunity to incorporate misty, gas-lit night-time scenes, and to give the whole affair a more old-fashioned, atmospheric Gothic vibe. It’s a pretty effective horror mystery that nonetheless leans on some outdated tropes, like disfigurement causing madness and someone deviously “putting on” a disability to avert suspicion. Like Mystery of the Wax Museum, the most memorable horror scene towards the end of the film involves our damsel in distress shattering the apparently flesh-and-blood face of her tormentor to reveal the hideously scarred visage hidden beneath.

Changing the setting and some incidental details aside, like giving Jarrod a hulking, silent assistant called Igor after the original mad wax artist, House of Wax is very much a re-tread of the earlier film with better production values and effects. Despite a mixed critical reception and a somewhat old-fashioned horror movie plot, it became a massive hit for Warner Brothers, dominating the box office for weeks and enrapturing audiences with its sensationalism and technological gimmickry.

The second reinterpretation didn’t come for another 52 years and was also very much a product of its time. Like many horror remakes of the early to mid-2000s (Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Halloween, The Hills Have Eyes), the film seems determined to explain away every last ambiguity, solve every mystery and present as much graphic violence as it can get away with. 

The 2005 film is essentially… what if House of Wax was also Texas Chainsaw Massacre?

We see a group of teenagers on a road trip that takes them through an isolated former industrial town. There they discover Bo and his brother Vincent (both played by Brian Van Holt), formally conjoined twins who are the only two living residents and have preserved their family and neighbours in eerie wax snapshots of small town life. The wax artist in this version is disfigured by an accident of birth, is completely silent, and wears a pristine mask as he takes his victims to add to his ongoing grisly art project.

Most of the film is a pretty run-of-the-mill slasher with disposable and interchangeable young people being picked off by a crazed killer in increasingly more elaborately brutal ways. Director Jaume Collet-Serra (The Shallows, Jungle Cruise) decides to realistically depict what boiling hot wax hitting your skin then later being peeled off would look like, and some of the bodily mutilation in the movie seems particularly unnecessarily cruel. His film is the least worth your time out of the three but is notable for having the best final act in a House of Wax film, which sees our final two survivors running from Vincent through his vast wax museum that is entirely constructed from the substance and has been set ablaze, melting away spectacularly around them. It’s an almost entirely practical sequence achieved with, among other things, a lot of peanut butter.

This remake, like the majority of similar attempts to relaunch horror franchises around this time, did not go down well. Paris Hilton’s casting was so negatively received at the time by horror fans that the Warner Bros marketing team decided, rather distastefully, to promote the movie as the place to “See Paris Die”. Roger Ebert, damning with faint praise in his review, said the film “will deliver most of what anyone attending House of Wax could reasonably expect… assuming it would be unreasonable to expect very much”. The 2005 film was not the financial success the previous iteration was, though it did spawn a modest cult following of gore hounds.

There’s clearly enough in this story to make multiple remakes seem worthwhile. The ghoulish premise, creepy atmosphere, and memorable prosthetics and effects work in each House of Wax makes them all a certain draw for horror fans, and which one you prefer will depend largely on your taste in scary movies. If you don’t mind hammy acting, then the first two films are probably better-made and are surprisingly technically sophisticated for mid-budget films made 90 and 70 years ago. The modern version offers fairly memorable gore and pleasingly doesn’t resort to CG-shortcuts very often, but it also has the most basic characterisation and is the most insistent on unnecessary exposition of the three films. Give one, or all of them a go; you’ll never look at an uncanny wax model of a celebrity in quite the same way again.

The studio’s now iconic brand of 3D computer animation changed studio animation across the world forever, even causing industry leaders Disney to change from 2D into 3D over the course of the 2000s. Among Pixar’s many hits and acclaimed award winners are Toy Story, the film that changed it all, and Monsters, Inc., Finding Nemo, Wall-E, Up, Coco, and Soul.

In this edition of Ranked, we here at the Film Magazine have teamed our writers up to complete a joint ranking of Pixar Animation Studios’ feature offerings, judging each film in terms of enjoyability, resonance, longevity, critical acclaim, and artistry.

Written by Mark Carnochan (MC), Jacob Davis (JD), Katie Doyle (KD), Martha Lane (ML), Sam Sewell-Peterson (SSP), and Joseph Wade (JW), these are the Pixar Animation Movies Ranked.

Follow @thefilmagazine on X (Twitter).

27. Lightyear (2022)

Budget: $200million
Box Office: $226.4million
Director: Angus MacLane

Coming out of the lockdown era that had forced many Pixar releases directly to Disney Plus (thus skewing their box office totals), the so-called “2nd Disney Studio” needed a big win with Lightyear that just didn’t come. It barely made its budget back, and with promotional costs taken into account actually made a loss for its parent company. The film was Toy Story, but not quite; a spin-off origin narrative explaining what the Buzz Lightyear toy was based on, a movie from the world of the Toy Story movies. In it, Buzz Lightyear (Chris Evans) fought a mysterious power-hungry evil force, finding his own ragtag group on a quest across galaxies to cement himself as a legend and save humankind.

Conceptually, Lightyear isn’t unlike many other Pixar movies: an underappreciated but cocky hero is humbled before achieving greatness with the only people (or creatures) that are willing to put up with him. This in-movie predictability, paired with the lack of clarity pre-release regarding exactly what Lightyear was, curtailed all of the usual Toy Story-universe excitement. It looks shiny, and some high-contrast space battles make for stunning sequences, while there is enough by way of stakes and twists to ensure an enjoyable time, but Lightyear was a cash-in and people could sense it; an expensive version of those direct-to-video Disney movies from the 1990s.

JW

26. Cars 3 (2017)

Budget: $175million
Box Office: $383.9million
Director: Brian Fee

By 2017, the only reason Pixar were forcing out new Cars instalments is because parent company Disney wanted some of those sweet merchandise profits. In 2011, following the release of Cars 2, Pixar revealed that the Cars franchise had made the company more than $10billion; current figures aren’t available, but even with a large curtailing of revenue, this franchise would be one of the most profitable film franchises of all time. In this fairly inconsequential film, Lightning McQueen plays the archetypal old sportsperson inspired to return for one last shot at glory. It isn’t quite Rocky Balboa, which isn’t even exceptional in the first place, but some of the animation is leaps beyond what was on offer in the first film.

Those charged with gifting this cash-grab with some kind of meaning or heart certainly tried – a feminist subplot indicated society’s advances in representation (both in sports and movies) in the decade since the original film and McQueen’s return to the spotlight held weight for those who enjoyed the original Cars movies – but these strangely designed cars were seemingly only ever destined for children’s bedrooms, the imaginations of those who played with the toys far outliving the impact or influence of this less-than stellar Pixar offering.

JW

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Name a more iconic actor-director pairing from the mid-20th century than Akira Kurosawa and Toshiro Mifune. Unless you were going to say John Wayne and John Ford, we’ll wait for you to get back to us.

Over 18 years and 16 films they carefully crafted together, many made back-to-back or in quick succession, both iconic figures in Japanese cinema indisputably produced the most memorable and lasting work of their respective lengthy careers, doing so whilst working in such eclectic genres as crime movies, romantic dramas, adaptations of Shakespeare and East Asian folklore, and of course, as soon as the post-war ban on martial depictions was lifted, jidaigeki samurai films.

Coincidentally, both men were already working in different areas of the Japanese film industry during WWII – Kurosawa made propaganda films while Mifune was deployed in the aerial photography division of the Japanese armed forces. They both eventually found their way to Japanese mega production company Toho Studios. Toho gave both director and star their home throughout their long creative partnership, Mifune being discovered quite by accident in the “New Face” mass casting call after being rejected for his preferred job as a camera operator, while Kurosawa had steadily worked his way up from an assistant director under his mentor – the versatile pre-war filmmaker Kajirō Yamamoto – to write and direct his own projects.

Akira Kurosawa, much like Alfred Hitchcock, valued a polished script above all else and did not believe even a talented director could make up for shortcomings on the page. To mitigate this, he worked closely with a group which functioned almost like a modern American TV writer’s room, in order to exchange and improve upon ideas, ensuring the consistent quality of his screenplays. The final film was usually  made with his trusted creative team, the “Kurosawa-gumi”, including writers such as Ryūzō Kikushima and Shinobu Hashimoto, cinematographer Asakazu Nakai and script supervisor Teruyo Nogami. 

The pair’s memorable first encounter at an audition is recalled by Kurosawa thusly: “a young man reeling around the room in a violent frenzy… it was as frightening as watching a wounded beast trying to break loose. I was transfixed.”

To put it simply: Mifune was a force of nature. His aptitude for fighting both on screen and off, and the manner in which he threw himself into any task without visible fear, his intense stare, booming voice and intimidating presence made him impossible to ignore. He always stood out even in the impressive ensemble casts of such films as Rashomon and Seven Samurai. Kurosawa ended up designing some of the most memorable sequences in his always vivid films around what Mifune was likely to do, even though requiring some flexibility to accommodate his bankable but uncontrollable star could be a real problem for a director who would not budge an inch from his creative vision without good reason.

Their distinct working method involved both men intensively preparing separately from each other, and while their commitment to their beloved art form and often passionate disagreements certainly bore fruit, by the midpoint of both of their careers in film – following the difficult, contentious and much-delayed shoot of Red Beard (1965) – actor and director parted ways for good. Mifune’s career continued steadily on in Japan and abroad, but Kurosawa struggled with his work and mental health for over a decade until his modest late-life creative resurgence (roughly marked by the release of Kagemusha in 1980). Neither man quite hit the same heights they had reached while working together ever again. 

It is profoundly difficult to pick out a truly representative handful of films to stand in for the imposing Kurosawa/Mifune back catalogue, so we’ve gone a seasonal route and picked one of their collaborations from their early “spring” period, another from midway through, their “summer” and “autumn” periods, and finally one towards the end, the “winter” of their creative partnership. Please enjoy the first of The Film Magazine’s new series: Cinema’s Greatest Collaborations.

Spring: Stray Dog (1949)

Toshiro Mifune played tough Yakuza gangsters a lot in his early roles, notably in his film breakthrough with Akira Kurosawa, Drunken Angel in 1948, but was given the chance to be a lot more nuanced here in his third collaboration with his soon-to-be creative partner, playing a hapless and insecure cop. Both this and Drunken Angel also star Kurosawa’s other acting muse Takashi Shimura, but it is Stray Dog that gives Mifune in particular far more room to breathe as the unquestionable lead of the story, and he has far more opportunities to demonstrate multiple facets of his screen persona.

This sweaty, intense urban drama asks, what’s the most humiliating thing that could happen to a cop? Being promoted to Detective then immediately having your gun stolen on public transport by a common pickpocket has to be up there with the worst possible scenarios. Detective Murakami’s inadequacies both as a law enforcer and as a man are explored time and time again as he inadvertently digs himself into an even deeper hole in trying to put things right, eventually seeking help from the more level-headed and canny Detective Sato (Shimura) out of sheer desperation.

Because of the way he looked and sounded, Mifune specialised in, and was typically typecast as, scary brutes and slovenly slobs, but his versatility is tested here as he gets to be vulnerable and haphazard in how his character tries to correct his mistake. He ineffectually tries to chase down, and is often outsmarted by, prostitutes, dealers and smugglers, and so has no choice but to latch on to a senior colleague who actually seems to know what he is doing. 

Perhaps the best scene in the entire film is one of the more low-key sequences, where after an entire day of chasing a key witness without a result, the sex worker in question buys him a beer and some food and listens to his woes before providing some key information seemingly not out of honesty or duty but out of pity for this pathetic excuse for a police officer. Kate Blowers highlights in her essay “A Japanese Bull in a China Shop” that “When things go wrong for Mifune—as they often do, particularly in his earlier films—they go tremendously wrong”. Perhaps no other film in the entire Kurosawa/Mifune filmography shows this as explicitly as Stray Dog.

Mifune’s eldest son Shirō described his father’s unmistakable presence and unique working method, which can be seen plainly in most of his screen appearances: “He’s not an actor who blends into the background. You feel him energising everything around him. [Even though] he studied his part thoroughly, in front of the camera when they yelled “Action!” he forgot everything and just went for it”. Mifune’s performance often had a feeling of improvisation around it despite his meticulous preparation, which helped all of his characters feel immediate and raw. 

Mifune could be scary, attention-grabbing and forceful, but in few of his films, especially those with Kurosawa, did he get to be this withdrawn, pitiable and fundamentally sad.

Summer: Throne of Blood (1957)

Throne of Blood is one of three Akira Kurosawa films heavily inspired by William Shakespeare plays (the others being the “Hamlet”-riffing The Bad Sleep Well and “King Lear” reimagined as Ran). In this case, the acclaimed director closely adapted “Macbeth”, transposing events to a particularly moody and atmospheric vision of Medieval Japan.

What better persona to embody barely-in-check madness than Mifune? As the increasingly unhinged Lord Washizu, he plays the part of a strong and charismatic leader, but with an ever-present element of instability, of unpredictability, perfect for any portrayal of Shakespeare’s severely troubled and timeless protagonist. Mifune’s exaggerated striding gait, mad stare and tendency to laugh inappropriately in deathly serious situations helped to punctuate many a serious Kurosawa scene with welcome levity, but here it’s all in aid of the high melodrama. 

The film is one of the few genuinely disturbing film adaptations of “Macbeth”, the more explicitly supernatural elements delving deeply into Japanese folklore and the striking visuals borrowing from Noh theatre traditions, from the makeup applied to the actors to the highly theatrical staging of the most powerful scenes. Gone are the three witches, in their place an evil forest spirit appearing as a decrepit woman spinning a loom, foretelling triumph and turmoil, the haunting spectres who appear unbidden to our Macbeth stand-in looking just like something from Japanese folkloric art. 

Either as a commitment to realism or out of sheer recklessness, Throne of Blood‘s unforgettable finale sees the (uninsured and potentially expensive star) Mifune being shot at with real arrows by a college archery team playing his lord’s treacherous army. Kurosawa at times seems to care so little for his star that you wonder how such high budget projects ever managed to get off the ground. Tom Cruise’s insurance coverage might be a nightmare to navigate for modern blockbuster filmmakers, but the same risks were in evidence decades earlier in Japan with Mifune. 

An observation made in feature documentary Mifune: The Last Samurai is that: “Kurosawa demanded everything from his cast and crew and was exacting in every detail, but he left it to Mifune to develop his own character, telling him “Do what you want with it”.” The Kurosawa-gumi had Shakespeare’s words, their own Japanese cultural perspective, and a whirling dervish of an acting force that simply needed to be pointed in the right direction and unleashed, so no extra embellishment was required to make the final product as dramatic as it could be. 

Haruo Nakajima (actor in Godzilla and Seven Samurai) remembers that “Mr. Kurosawa would spend an entire day filming one shot… Working with Mr. Kurosawa was like working on a play instead of a movie. We would spend a great deal of time rehearsing. It was torturous.” While this rule of intensive rehearsal  and control over his cast went for most of Kurosawa’s cast members, particularly on such high-profile and expensive features as Seven Samurai, it didn’t seem to apply to Mifune because giving him such instruction simply couldn’t be done. Luckily for Kurosawa, he saw what Mifune brought to the table and worked around him rather well.

Autumn: The Bad Sleep Well (1960)

Two characters who are shown talking about Mifune’s character in The Bad Sleep Well are neatly analogous for how this particular performance took many viewers by surprise: “What’s his efficiency rating? / Almost perfect, but he is very reserved.”

Extremely dialled-back by his usual standards this particular performance may be, this demonstrates Mifune at his coolest and most suave. Rather than unleashing a hurricane, Kurosawa tapped into his star’s captivating camera presence and inherent charisma to keep the focus always on him when he’s on screen and the audience’s thinking on him whenever he isn’t. 

Mifune plays Kōichi Nishi, seemingly an ambitious corporate type who marries into the family who run the corrupt Dairyu Construction Company, engineering an elaborate scheme to bring the company down from the inside as revenge for a family loss as a result of their dirty dealings. Though we only see him briefly in the opening sequence before the film’s first half focuses on the other key players, the denouement is all about Nishi and his plans coming to fruition, doing very bad things to bad people; Mifune being calm, collected and crafty all the way through.

Chuck Stephens commented on Mifune’s anti-hero in his essay for Criterion: “though he is mute for the first thirty minutes of the movie, it is Mifune’s stoic Nishi who will soon be shown as the poker-faced pivot around which the film’s every action and reaction will revolve.”

The Bad Sleep Well launched Kurosawa’s self-titled production company independent of Toho and marked a move from outright commercial filmmaking, the release making a slight loss at the Japanese box office but still earning plaudits from critics at home, particularly for its intricately plotted, noirish first half.

Kurosawa going independent of Japan’s biggest studio allowed him to get extremely political and discuss the dire state of post-war Japanese business practices, particularly in the film’s repeated insult: “He’s not a man, he’s an official”. Kurosawa uses the “Hamlet” story template and makes it as modern and relevant as it could be to a country re-establishing itself, and with his newfound freedom from interfering studio higher-ups and with the end of post-war restrictions on explicit political commentary in Japanese cinema, he could really get stuck in. Chuck Stephens again described Kurosawa’s aims for the film succinctly: “a film whose bitter intent—to throw open the windows of Japanese corporate corruption and air out the stench—is staged as a series of haltingly revealed motivations, haggard resurrections, and harrowing defeats“.

Despite the fascination of seeing Mifune breaking his usual mould, this most definitely wasn’t a crowd-pleaser – the film is hard-going and demands your constant attention – but Kurosawa’s main goal was to ask his audience to consider Japan’s place in the world and what, if anything, could be justifiably sacrificed on a moral level for the sake of economic stability. 

Winter: Yojimbo (1961)

From the extremes of a dark and cerebral social issues film, Akira Kurosawa and Toshiro Mifune’s next collaboration spawned a character so successful it resulted in the pair’s only direct sequel. Sanjuro came just a year after Yojimbo, which in turn spawned the completely unauthorised remake (as in “we’ll see you in court” unauthorised) from Sergio Leone, A Fistful of Dollars, which kick-started the iconic Dollars Trilogy starring Clint Eastwood.

Mifune plays a nameless rōnin (wandering, masterless samurai) wearing a shabby kimono, unabashedly scratching and yawning away, seemingly uninterested in the affairs of the world except for where his next meal is coming from. He is reluctantly pressed into service to defend a town from some cruel local gangsters, but does not feel obligated to go above and beyond what he is being paid to do.

Forming his own production company, Kurosawa Productions, to house his more ambitious projects and lessen Toho’s understandable fears of heavy financial losses following the uninspiring reception of the challenging corporate thriller The Bad Sleep Well, Kurosawa returned to the Samurai films he was still best-known for and helped establish many a convention of lone warrior action movies in the following decades with Yojimbo.

Hisao Kurosawa (the director’s eldest son) points out that “Yojimbo was Kurosawa’s attempt at doing something fun. He wanted to do something everyone would enjoy”. This is Kurosawa doing popcorn entertainment, and it and its sequel Sanjuro influenced multiple genres and wider cinematic iconography for the following decades, including the way fight scenes (both sword duels and quick-draw gunfights) were staged and edited in addition to establishing how you use stylised violence to punctuate a genre film in everything from Sam Peckinpah’s The Wild Bunch to Quentin Tarantino’s Kill Bill. 

If there’s one indelible image associated with this film, it’s the iconic finale with Sanjuro/the Ronan with No Name (much like Clint Eastwood’s Western icon he never receives a definitive moniker) facing off against the criminal gang in a deserted, windswept street. Previously an insouciant, unflappable presence as prone to standing by and laughing at threats as fighting them, in this moment and despite the seemingly overwhelming odds he becomes the hero the town deserves and dispatches the foes outnumbering him impressively easily and in record time. This was another of Mifune’s skills, he could switch modes in the blink of an eye from sleepy house cat to ferocious tiger (the latter of which was famously an inspiration for the restless way some of his characters moved).

Steven Spielberg theorises that “We don’t make the heroes, it’s up to the audience to turn a character into a hero. And the power of that is in the performance of the actor, it’s up to the actor even more than the director, because a director can only pull so many strings, but if a director pulls too many strings it’s a puppet not an artist”.

Teruyo Nogami (regular Kurosawa script supervisor and one of the director’s inner circle of creatives) said that “People have no idea how hard [Mifune] worked. He was always thinking about his character and how to add humour to it”. No matter how intense Mifune’s screen presence was and how thematically layered Kurosawa’s greatest films are, both men saw the value of diffusing tension, of giving a scene a more varied rhythm and a character more humanity with the addition of a funny grace-note, background buffoonery to repeated physical tics. 

Akira Kurosawa and Toshiro Mifune were a creative partnership for the ages, one that left an indelible mark on film in Japan and around the world, and as artists they were never stronger than when they were working side-by-side. Despite not speaking to arguably his most significant creative collaborator for three decades, when he outlived his muse by just a few months Kurosawa sent a letter to be read at Mifune’s funeral, movingly capturing what their love-hate relationship and their long and often tumultuous collaboration really meant, and perhaps in his way apologising for the way things ultimately turned out:

“When I look back on each and every film, I couldn’t have made them without you. You gave so much of yourself. Thank you, my friend.”

Recommended for you: Where to Start with Akira Kurosawa

With filmmakers as diverse in technique as Brad Bird, JJ Abrams, and Brian De Palma having helmed instalments over the years, and a range of reputable stars from Philip Seymour Hoffman to Simon Pegg having leant their hands to the franchise on the screen, this spy-turned-action series of globe-trotting films has offered fresh, exciting, heart-pounding moments time and time again.

Now one of the most successful spy-action franchises in the history of cinema, Mission: Impossible is undeniably a cultural touchstone. In this edition of Ranked, our mission (which we have chosen to accept) is to compare and contrast each Mission: Impossible movie and judge them in terms of artistry, cultural relevance, genre importance and popular consensus, to decide which franchise entry is the best and (first) which is the worst. These are the Mission Impossible Movies Ranked.

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7. Mission: Impossible III (2006)

Featuring a script from the since maligned Roberto Orci (Transformers) and Alex Kurtzman (The Mummy, 2017) – “Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall” being perhaps the most poorly judged one liner in the franchise’s history – Mission: Impossible III committed perhaps the biggest faux pas of the series: it lacked originality. To get around some of the limitations of screenwriting for a spy thriller, the writers tacked new elements onto lead protagonist Ethan Hunt’s story and conveniently forgot about other aspects in order to establish forced anchors for emotion, though the narrative manipulation wasn’t cleverly disguised enough to be even close to as thrilling as the franchise’s best efforts.

On the screen, director JJ Abrams was unable to capture the urgency of the mystery that Brian De Palma had managed in the original film, nor the velocity of the action that John Woo had (for better or worse) presented in the sequel, while the barely passable script was a pit of expository dialogue and narrative convenience disguised by chopping the timeline up and offering a surprisingly strong action-focused third act. Philip Seymour Hoffman made mountains of gold from dirt here, but even a great screen actor like him was unable to overcome the limitations offered on the page.

Even so, the series’ trademarked high-octane stunt spectaculars remained, and in a number of aesthetically pleasing locations too – Toronto and Shanghai, to name just two. One sequence, involving Tom Cruise base jumping from a skyscraper in the dead of night was one of the franchise’s most memorable moments, and was arguably one of the reasons for Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol ever being green lit.

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Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One (2023)
Director: Christopher McQuarrie
Screenwriters: Erik Jendresen, Christopher McQuarrie
Starring: Tom Cruise, Hayley Atwell, Ving Rhames, Simon Pegg, Rebecca Ferguson, Vanessa Kirby, Frederick Schmidt, Esai Morales, Pom Klementieff, Henry Czerny, Greg Tarzan Davis, Shea Wigham, Cary Elwes

Superstar actor, producer and filmmaker Tom Cruise has undergone something of a renaissance in the eyes of the filmgoing public since his last appearance as Ethan Hunt in Mission: Impossible – Fallout in 2018. He was one of the first stars to publicly visit a cinema following the COVID closures of 2020 and 2021, and was one of the filmmaking giants to demand that television manufacturers include an option to turn off motion blur to better preserve filmmaking intent. As such, his relentless ambition to provide each of us with a reason to go and watch the biggest films on the biggest screens has been re-evaluated as the positive that it is. And, now, in 2023, he is one of the foremost champions of cinema – one of the last remaining bastions of the theatrical experience, a man using his reach to help save the box office. In 2022, he brought audiences of all ages back to the cinema with the summer’s biggest box office hit, Top Gun: Maverick, and in 2023 his mission is to bring them back again. While Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One is unlikely to have the same vast appeal to casual filmgoing audiences as his decades-long sequel in the making did in 2022, there remains the same Once In a Lifetime aura around this latest Tom Cruise project. Dead Reckoning Part One is all Dutch angles, fast-paced chases, astonishing stunts, and earnest declarations of love; a fitting tribute to the history of the Mission: Impossible franchise and mainstream Hollywood cinema as a whole.

There’s an Artificial Intelligence seeking to end the world, or at least the world as we know it, and to stop the beastly “entity” from enacting global change, Ethan Hunt (Tom Cruise) and his rag-tag crew of favourites (Ving Rhames, Simon Pegg and Rebecca Ferguson) must track down a key said to threaten its very existence. The issue is that every world-leading state, government agency and criminal is looking to control the power that the entity possesses, and will do anything to find the keys necessary to wield it.

The villain is a supercomputer using algorithms to enforce evil, and the old-school hero who won’t sacrifice his friends is leading the charge against it – it’s almost meta. Cruise publicly fought studio Paramount to release both Top Gun: Maverick and this Mission: Impossible film theatrically as studios began to transition their releases to streaming in the midst of uncertainty surrounding the box office, and his outspoken support of the theatrical experience is one of the reasons we haven’t lost cinema to the algorithmic forces of streaming giants just yet. In a franchise that has always been very self-aware, has always sought to pay tribute to film history, and has been dedicated to pushing the spy and action genres forward since its inception, Dead Reckoning – Part One is one giant allegory for the potential end-days of the theatrical experience. And it’s a whole heap of fun to boot!

Director Christopher McQuarrie has been a long-term friend and creative partner of Tom Cruise – their relationship having started in the mid-2000s – and the director certainly knows how to marry his visions to those of his iconic leading star. His Mission: Impossible films – Rogue Nation and Fallout – have each featured boundary-pushing action sequences and been rapidly paced, as well as deeply allegorical and loaded with stakes. His films have been brilliantly balanced between the energy and appeal of action and the character dynamics needed to underpin everything with meaning. Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One is another worthwhile addition to his oeuvre, and another thrilling and emotive Mission: Impossible film.

There are evolutions to the director’s storytelling style that are noticeable in Dead Reckoning Part One, with the aforementioned Dutch angles the most quickly noticeable. In a film filled with characters related to Ethan Hunt’s past, and indeed about foregoing a total reliance on technology, this latest Mission: Impossible movie revisits the filmmaking principles evident in Brian De Palma’s 1996 original, borrowing visual techniques and paying homage to fan-favourite characteristics in a way that not only best pays tribute to the history of the franchise and the techniques of old masters, but delights in its effectiveness to the story being told.

It isn’t all thrills and chills, however. The film wrestles with its status as the first part of a longer narrative – it lays out a lot of information in the prologue, and loses momentum in some sections where the mere presence of some characters is supposed to maintain interest. It’s understandable that the filmmakers looked to provide depth to their overarching narrative at the beginning, and it no doubt adds to the intrigue of the villainous entity and the human beings orbiting its presence, but as a result Part One isn’t quite so thrill-a-minute as predecessor Mission: Impossible – Fallout. Furthermore, it is almost entirely absent of the comedic appeal of the other films, with Simon Pegg’s Benji a notably more traumatised, stressed out and serious version of the character than before – and understandably so – and the world-ending stakes overriding most of the idiosyncrasies of the usual group dynamic we’ve come to love, though Hayley Atwell’s addition to the cast is written effectively and played tremendously well. These are issues that, overall, are by no means off-putting to anyone already interested in the group’s story, or the Mission: Impossible franchise as a whole, but it means that Dead Reckoning Part One doesn’t swagger quite like the previous two films.

Real stunts and a clear objective to avoid computer generated imagery assist the spectacular location scouting in offering that which every great action movie should aim to offer: something we’ve never seen before. And they act doubly to reinforce the very purpose of the allegory underpinning the story. In filming sequences such as Tom Cruise driving a motorcycle off the edge of the cliff, there is also so much to become wide-eyed about, and it’s all so beautifully driven home by Lorne Balfe’s arguably franchise-topping work on the score. In Dead Reckoning – Part One, there is a classic sensibility to Balfe’s work, a timelessness that makes for good company to the film’s wider intent of celebrating cinema.

Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One is an exciting time at the movies. The kind of film you’ll want to hear with the best speakers around, and will want to see on the biggest screen possible. Tom Cruise remains as magnetic as he ever was, and the series remains as exciting as it can possibly be. There may be some elements that feel underwhelming in comparison to the franchise-topping work of the past movie, but for what it adds and how it champions what it champions, Dead Reckoning – Part One is another worthwhile celebration of spy-action cinema that leaves you chomping at the bit for its 2nd part. Tom Cruise was right to champion this as a theatrical release.

Score: 18/24

Recommended for you: Mission: Impossible Films Ranked

Across more than 20 years, directors Brian De Palma, John Woo, J.J. Abrams, Brad Bird and Christopher McQuarrie have collectively worked alongside star and producer Tom Cruise to achieve excellence. In this Movie List from The Film Magazine, we are comparing and contrasting all of their work to judge which sequences the Mission: Impossible franchise can be most proud of. These are the 7 Most Iconic Mission: Impossible Sequences.

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7. The Interrogation – Mission: Impossible III (2006)

For a series so renowned for action, it is actually a moment of dialogue that stands as the third instalment’s most iconic scene: the excruciatingly tense interrogation between Tom Cruise’s Ethan Hunt and Philip Seymour Hoffman’s Owen Davian.

As a cold open, there’s not much in the way of plot details or wider context, but with a script as snappy as this, it isn’t really needed – especially when Cruise and Hoffman are absolutely giving it their all.

Don’t underestimate director J.J Abrams and cinematographer Dan Mindel’s signature camera work though. In the post-Bourne world of 2006, these tight hand-held close ups may have been fairly ubiquitous, but they still work and give the necessary claustrophobic energy to have you instantly on the edge of your seat.

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6. Ethan Catches a Plane – Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation (2015)

As introductions go, Ethan Hunt clinging to the side of an Airbus A400M Atlas is not bad going. And that’s exactly what we got to kick off the fifth instalment of the Mission: Impossible franchise, Rogue Nation. 

Even by Tom Cruise’s standards, this was audacious, and remains perhaps the barmiest stunt the series has attempted to date. Filmed at RAF Wittering in the UK, the few shots that make up this spectacular sequence took eight flights to finally nail, with Cruise travelling at speeds of up to 260mph whilst held in place by a harness.

Yes, there’s a narrative behind it, with stolen chemical weapons and Belarusian agents, but the details of the plot are largely unimportant. This was essentially a very expensive excuse for director Christopher McQuarrie and his Hollywood A-List lead to try something never done before.

Although this isn’t Rogue Nation’s strongest set piece, it’s hard to deny the feeling of breathlessness that comes with this iconic shot of Ethan clinging to the plane as the runway rapidly falls away.

Jurassic Park (1993)
Director: Steven Spielberg
Screenwriters: Michael Crichton, David Koepp
Starring: Sam Neill, Laura Dern, Jeff Goldblum, Richard Attenborough, Ariana Richards, Joseph Mazzello, Wayne Knight, Samuel L. Jackson

Jurassic Park stomped onto the big screen thirty years ago and became an instant classic, loved by adults and children alike. It was the highest-grossing film of all time until Titanic cruised into the top spot four years later. Jurassic Park’s setting, humour, John Williams score, all-star cast, and larger-than-life characters made it an unforgettable story. One that boasts the rare accolade of being better than the book it’s based on.

John Hammond (Richard Attenborough) has built a wildlife park with a difference. Its inhabitants are bona fide dinosaurs. After an incident with a park ‘attraction’, Hammond needs the safety of the park verified. So, before its grand public opening, he invites respected experts in the field, Dr Alan Grant (Sam Neill), Dr Ellie Sattler (Laura Dern), and Dr Ian Malcolm (Jeff Goldblum) to have a look around. Oh, and his grandchildren naturally. Immediately, things go wrong. It turns out you can control a T-rex about as well as you can a hurricane.

Casting the much-beloved Richard Attenborough as John Hammond was an inspired choice. Hammond is a man seemingly passionate about furthering science and it’s easy to believe that this is his only goal when you look into the kind, open face of the iconic actor. As the story unfolds, it becomes clear that Hammond is obsessed rather than passionate, to the degree that he would risk his own grandchildren’s lives. He is a man so full of ego and the idea of his own legacy that he is blind to his failings.

The three experts, Drs Grant, Sattler, and Malcolm, are the driving force of the plot. Their childlike wonder reflecting our same reactions. Grant’s interactions with the children (Ariana Richards and Joseph Mazzello) is where a lot of the humour comes from, and Malcolm’s complete incredulity at what is happening is the injection of scepticism that pushes Hammond and the scientists into making more ridiculous decisions. Ellie Sattler is an icon. Whip smart, defending feminism, rocking sensible hiking boots, and willing to go elbow deep in triceratops turd in the pursuit of answers. An icon.

Jurassic Park is not a film about dinosaurs, it’s about these characters and what they come to represent thematically. It is a film about human hubris, about our species’ need to conquer and control. Then it is a film about resolve and humility in the face of mistake and human error. It is a film where nature’s awesome power wins as all the humans can do is retreat hastily into the sunset.

While the T-rex is a formidable foe, and the iconic logo of the franchise, the velociraptors are also worthy adversaries for this ensemble of plucky human characters. A herd of clever girls, if you will. The intrigue lay so heavily with these animals that it is the raptors who play major parts in four of the five subsequent films. Director Steven Spielberg and author Michael Crichton weren’t so interested in an accurate depiction of a velociraptor – Jurassic Park’s popularity means that the cultural version of them seems so much more likely than the feathery death turkeys they most probably were.

Given how iconic such creatures remain after three decades, it remains noteworthy to acknowledge how dinosaurs are only seen on screen for fourteen minutes of Jurassic Park’s runtime. This is a suspense-building technique that director Steven Spielberg perfected in Jaws. The dinos are always waiting just off screen, which adds a delicious level of anticipation and one hell of a punch when they do take centre stage. Furthering this impact is how the animatronics and CGI have aged just as well as the core message. Those one-hundred and thirteen dinosaur-free minutes also help the film adhere to the PG rating that allowed it to become a family favourite.

While Jurassic Park birthed some pretty terrible films, the original remains a must-see. It left a generation of viewers certain that they could explain chaos theory with a drip of water and confident that if they stood perfectly still, they would never be eaten by a T-rex*. In today’s climate when human action is causing catastrophic ripples through the natural world, and billionaires play fast and loose with the planet’s resources, there are many themes in Jurassic Park that continue to resonate as clearly as a metal ladle clanging on the tiled floor of a velociraptor-strewn kitchen.

Jurassic Park’s descendants lack the magic of the original, which is a cliché-avoiding, character-driven, genre-defining rampage. It is iconic moment after iconic moment.

Score: 24/24

*Tyrannosaurs actually had impeccable eyesight so official advice for bumping into a T-rex is to run. Fast.

Her career spans back to 2006, making brief appearances in British indie films such as Venus (2006) and Happy-Go-Lucky (2008), paving the way for her future starring roles in Blockbuster hits. After taking the stage in theatre productions including “Inanov” (2008) and “The Pride” (2010), Riseborough began to form a name for herself on the silver screen, co-starring in Oblivion (2013) with the likes of Tom Cruise and Morgan Freeman, and featuring in the Oscar-winning Birdman (2014). 

Upon receiving a string of awards, including multiple Best Supporting Actress titles, Riseborough took the mainstage and ushered in a succession of eclectic starring roles that would cement her place as a respected, cherished performer. 

In an ode to her being one of the most exciting actors currently working in the industry, here are Three Career-Defining Performances from Andrea Riseborough. 

Follow @thefilmagazine on Twitter.

1. Nancy (2018)

Christiana Choe’s Nancy brings about a conflicting narrative that aims to question its viewer’s moral alignment. Such a taxing film needs a strong lead capable of transfixing emotional confusion, making Riseborough an elite candidate for the titular role of Nancy.

The film tackles the story of a lost thirty-something-year-old who uses her time to create bemusing identities and scamming schemes under various pseudonyms online. Whilst cultivating these hoaxes, she comes across a couple who have lost their daughter 30 years prior. With a dwindling mental state, Nancy becomes convinced that the unsuspecting couple are her biological parents. 

Riseborough puts on a tremendous display of hopelessness with a mystifying sense of ambiguity where it is never quite revealed how damaged Nancy’s emotional state is. Whilst the film alludes to absurd sensibilities where chaos thrives amidst the muted background, Riseborough paves the way with an unhinged, yet somehow composed attitude. We cannot help but want to believe in Nancy’s disturbed theories, no matter how far-fetched they may be.

This film relishes in its omnipresent mystery, with much of that aura becoming unleashed thanks to Riseborough’s beguiling hold over our grasp of reality.

2. Possessor (2020)

Possessor Review

Possessor seemed to dominate the world of cinema during its release in 2020, with audiences being both shocked and amused by the incredibly graphic and alluring world that director Brandon Cronenberg sets up in the film.

Riseborough played the dualistically toned role of Tasya Vos, an assassin who is able to take control of any individual’s body to complete a hit. During one particularly strenuous mission, she is tasked with inhabiting the body of Colin Tate (Christopher Abbot) to kill his father-in-law (Sean Bean) and fiancé (Tuppence Middleton). Although much of the film sees Abbot perform as the nonconsenting assassin, Riseborough infects her runtime with such ferocity that Possessor would not be the same without her. 

Possessor’s premise is at the root vile, almost parasitic. Where Riseborough chimes in through this abhorrent narrative is with her character taking on a treacherously tragic role. Through Tasya’s tenancy in other people’s skin, she is unable to form any sense of identity, which is made even more terrifying when it is revealed that she has her own family to also tend to.

Riseborough balances such careful fluidity through Tasya, exposing how versatile she is as an actor. She is able to play a character with no real emotion of her own, whilst still putting on a gripping, devastating show of fantastical dread.

3. To Leslie (2022)

A drama film is only as good as its lead. To drive home the power intended behind any emotional piece of filmmaking, its central performer needs to be an open vessel for the effect to seep through. Michael Morris’s debut feature To Leslie employs Riseborough’s commanding abilities to stir up a mass of conflicting sentiments that call to the actress’s adaptive qualities.

The film follows an alcoholic, Leslie (Riseborough), whose winnings from a previous lottery win have all dried up, leaving her to squander around questioning her purpose, and to come to terms with her addictions. 

To Leslie lays heavy on the hardcore subject matter, which like in Nancy and Possessor is made all the more potent thanks to Riseborough fully assimilating into the shoes of a ruined, hopeless woman. The film valiantly unveils the trauma that Leslie inflicts upon the people around her, whether that be her estranged son James (Owen Teague), or motel owner Sweeney (Marc Maron), who hires Leslie despite her continuous wrongdoings.

Whilst Riseborough portrays a character the viewer roots for, she still manages to convey a disquieting person on the brink of total self-sabotage.

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Andrea Riseborough has thus far in her career earned a lot of respect from her collaborators and fellow professionals for her commitment to her craft and the bravery of her choices. At the Oscars in 2023, her nomination for Actress in a Leading Role was subject to an investigation for breaching campaign rules when a number of popular and influential actresses campaigned on her behalf, ensuring her seat at the table of great living actresses. Now just into her forties, there seems plenty of opportunity for this British performer to earn yet more plaudits in the future.