The Wife (2018), directed by Bjorn Runge

It is 1992 and New York writer Joseph Castleman has been awarded the Nobel Prize for literature, an achievement he openly acknowledges would not have been possible without his devoted wife Joan. Their relationship appears on the surface to be entirely conventional, but as the couple travels to Sweden for the award ceremony, a series of flashbacks to the 50s and 60s gradually reveal a deeper truth. The film explores the complexity behind the cliché of the good woman behind every great man, demonstrating how the patriarchy buries the talent and potential of women in order to maintain its power and predominance. Glen Close is amazing as Joan, ably supported by Jonathan Pryce as loveable arsehole Joseph and Christian Slater as a would-be biographer who stirs the pot. Max Irons battles with an underwritten character as their troubled son David. Annie Starke is well cast as the younger version of Joan, her similarity to Close no surprise when you realise she is her daughter. This is such an interesting film with many layers, painted in shades of grey, as no-one is wholly a hero or a villain. It exposes the hypocrisy of the literary and publishing worlds and its parallels in relationships.