In the 1996 British comedy-drama Secrets & Lies, Hortense, a young middle-class black woman in London, having lost both of her adoptive parents, decides to seek out her biological mother - who turns out to be a working-class white woman named Cynthia.

Director Mike Leigh is known for collaborating in depth with his actors to create vivid, deeply realized characters and performances. Secrets & Lies is an outstanding specimen of a lost genre: a kitchen-sink drama that relies entirely on its rich humanity to keep us watching. Andrew Petiprin joins Criteria to discuss the movie.

Links

Spe Salvi Institute https://www.spesalviinstitute.com/

Article about the displacement of Cockneys, "Indigenous London" https://firstthings.com/indigenous-london/

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Music is The Duskwhales, "Take It Back", used with permission. https://theduskwhales.bandcamp.com