Movie Reviews - Can You Ever Forgive Me?

Director: Marielle Heller
Genre: Drama/ Comedy
Runtime: 109 minutes
Year: 2018
Starring: Melissa McCarthy, Richard E. Grant, Dolly Wells, Ben Falcone, Jane Curtin

Description: When writer Lee Israel (Melissa McCarthy) falls out of step with current taste, she turns her art form to deception.

Review: Author Lee Israel called it her best work: the letters that got her arrested. To get by, Israel sold letters from famous writers like Noël Coward, Dorothy Parker and Ernest Hemmingway. She wrote them herself, on old typewriters, in the style of the sender. And she did it well, that even highly trained literary collectors didn’t see they were forged. She eventually managed to sell around 400 letters.
Israel had some success in the seventies and eighties, with two well received biographies. After her book about Estée Lauder didn’t become a bestselling novel, writer’s block hit her right in the face. And she lost total grace in the literary world. But this was also her character. Israel was a complex and difficult to deal with woman. A mundane job was not for her. When she hit rock bottom, forging letters was her way out.
It took her a year and a half to be discovered by the FBI. “Can You Ever Forgive Me?” is based on Israel’s memoires, and shows how she worked. But most of all how pigheaded, weary and witty she actually was. It’s an alluring portrait of an anything but alluring woman. And she isn’t your typical main character, definitely not as a woman. That the film makers decided not to make her more sympathetic, is a very bold move. But it works very well because of it.
Melissa McCarthy is mostly known for her comedy roles and she often is very over the top. But in “Can You Ever Forgive Me” she is admirably modest. And because they don’t put the focus on the laughs, the jokes work better and Israel’s harrowing loneliness is more perceptible. Richard E. Grant plays Jack Hock, a similar type of outcast who befriends Israel. And his performance is super strong as well. Both actors were nominated for an Academy Award for their roles.
Touching moments and harsh humor vary and the film is wonderfully crafted.

Rating: 4,5/ 5