TOM's Film Club: Madeline's Madeline (15)

A sensorial and immersive trip into a teen’s psyche, Madeline’s Madeline boldly dissects mental health, racial tensions, and the vampiric relationship between identity and performance.

Starring Miranda July, Molly Parker, and standout newcomer Helena Howard, this is relentless, electrifying cinema that solidifies Josephine Decker’s position at the forefront of contemporary experimental filmmaking.

Sixteen-year-old Madeline has become an active member of an experimental theatre troupe. When its ambitious director pushes Madeline to weave her rich interior world and her troubled relationship with her mother into their collective art, the lines between performance and reality begin to blur.

“At various times, it resembles Roman Polanski’s Repulsion, Charlie Kaufman’s Synecdoche, New York and Alan Parker’s Fame. It’s an immersive and exotic experience. Howard is a revelation”
Peter Bradshaw, The Guardian