Leigh's best work yet is indisputably screen art, but it's a flesh-and-blood 'people' movie, too.
Secrets & Lies
Roxanne drives her mother crazy. Maurice never speaks to his niece. Cynthia has a shock for her family. Monica can't talk to her husband. Hortense has never met her mother.
1996 · 2h 22m · R
Drama
Directed by
Mike Leigh
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Secrets & Lies
Overview
After her adoptive mother dies, Hortense, a successful black optometrist, seeks out her birth mother. She's shocked when her research leads her to Cynthia, a working class white woman.
Director and cast
- Mike Leigh Director
- Brenda Blethyn as Cynthia Rose Purley
- Marianne Jean-Baptiste as Hortense Cumberbatch
- Timothy Spall as Maurice Purley
- Phyllis Logan as Monica Purley
- Claire Rushbrook as Roxanne Purley
- Liz Smith Cast
- Lee Ross as Paul
- Lesley Manville as The Social Worker
- Jonny Coyne as Fiancé (as Jonathan Coyne)
- Elizabeth Berrington as Jane
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