Film
Can You Ever Forgive Me?
- Director
- Marielle Heller
- Certificate
- 15
- Running Time
- 106 mins
Who could resist a biographical comedy-drama about a literary fraud that finally gives talented Melissa McCarthy a big screen role that doesn’t hinge entirely on her being a fat woman who falls over a lot? Written by Nicole (Friends with Money) Holofcener and directed by Marielle (The Diary of a Teenage Girl) Heller, the fully F-rated Can You Ever Forgive Me? boasts McCarthy’s best performance to date as Lee Israel: an irascible, alcoholic writer of celebrity biogs whose work has fallen out of critical favour.
With the assistance of her gay chum Jack Hock (Richard E. Grant), she embarks on a lucrative new venture forging salacious private letters by deceased writers, playwrights, and actors. The Boston Globe‘s reviewer nailed it: “In addition to its other strengths – serving as a reminder of the kind of small, satisfying movie they don’t make anymore, showcasing the depths of Melissa McCarthy’s talents – Can You Ever Forgive Me? celebrates a hardy but endangered species: the Nasty New Yorker. It’s been a while since I’ve enjoyed spending so much time with someone so unpleasant.” Go here for our review.
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