Directed by:
Mike LeighScreenplay:
Mike LeighCinematography:
Dick PopeComposer:
Andrew DicksonCast:
Timothy Spall, Brenda Blethyn, Marianne Jean-Baptiste, Phyllis Logan, Claire Rushbrook, Elizabeth Berrington, Michele Austin, Lesley Manville, Ron Cook (more)Plots(1)
Writer-director Mike Leigh reached new levels of expressive power and intricacy in his ongoing contemplation of unembellished humanity with this resonant exploration of the deceptions, small and large, that shape our relationships to those we love. When Hortense (Marianne Jean-Baptiste), a Black optometrist who was adopted as a child, begins the search for her birth mother, she doesn't expect that it will lead her to Cynthia (Brenda Blethyn, winner of the Cannes Film Festival's best actress award), a desperately lonely white factory worker whose tentative embrace of her long-lost daughter sends shock waves through the rest of her already fragile family. Born from a painstaking process of rehearsal and improvisation with a powerhouse ensemble cast, Secrets & Lies is a Palme d'Or–winning tour de force of sustained tension and catharsis that lays bare the emotional fault lines running beneath the surface of everyday lives. (Criterion)
(more)Awards
- Winner
- Nominations
Academy Awards
- 1997 - Best Motion Picture of the Year
- 1997 - Mike Leigh (Best Achievement in Directing)
- 1997 - Brenda Blethyn (Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role)
- 1997 - Marianne Jean-Baptiste (Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role)
- 1997 - Mike Leigh (Best Original Screenplay)
Independent Spirit Awards
- 1997 - Mike Leigh (Best International Film)
British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA)
- 1997 - Brenda Blethyn (Best Leading Actress)
- 1997 - Mike Leigh (Best Original Screenplay)
- 1997 - Outstanding British Film
- 1997 - Best Film
- 1997 - Mike Leigh (Best Director)
- 1997 - Timothy Spall (Best Leading Actor)
- 1997 - Marianne Jean-Baptiste (Best Supporting Actress)
European Film Awards
- 1996 - Mike Leigh (Best Film)
César Awards
- 1997 - Best Foreign Film
Goya Awards
- 1997 - Mike Leigh (Best European Feature)
Golden Globes
- 1997 - Brenda Blethyn (Best Actress in a Motion Picture – Drama)
- 1997 - Best Motion Picture – Drama
- 1997 - Marianne Jean-Baptiste (Best Supporting Actress – Motion Picture)
Florida Film Critics Circle Awards
- 1996 - Brenda Blethyn (Best Actress)
Los Angeles Film Critics Association Awards
- 1996 - Best Film
- 1996 - Mike Leigh (Best Director)
- 1996 - Brenda Blethyn (Best Actress)
Cannes Film Festival
- 1996 - Mike Leigh (Golden Palm - Official Competition)
- 1996 - Brenda Blethyn (Best Actress)
- 1996 - Mike Leigh (Prize of the Ecumenical Jury)
Norwegian International Film Festival Haugesund
- 1996 - Mike Leigh (The Norwegian Critics Award - Honorable Mention)
- 1996 - Mike Leigh (The Ray of Sunshine)