Why we picked it – a mysterious film about love past and present, tinged with loss and sadness.

Synopsis – Adam (Andrew Haigh) is a screenwriter, trying to write about his past and his parents who died in a car crash when he was twelve. He starts a tentative relationship with Harry (Paul Mescal), seemingly the only other resident in the block of flats where they live in central London. Then, during a visit to his suburban childhood home, he meets his parents (Jamie Bell and Claire Foy – brilliant) – unchanged and living as they did 30 years before. The two stories inter-relate as Adam explores who he is.

The film – The director’s two previous films – Weekend and 45 Years – had the common theme of a long-standing marriage under strain. This film is a healing of Adam’s relationship with his parents – there are long-belated conversations about his sexuality that should have taken place in the distant 1980s – and the hope of a new one as an adult. It is a mark of the film’s success that the unreal elements of the story (both past and present) passes almost unnoticed. Here’s a Q&A with the Andrew Haigh together with Andrew Scott and Jamie Bell.

If you want to jump ahead there is a conversation between Andrew Scott and Greta Lee on the webpage for Past Lives where they discuss the links between the two films and their experience of acting in them.

Director and Writer: Andrew Haigh (from a story by Taichi Yamada) Cinematography: Jamie Ramsay UK 2023

Links imdb Financial Times The Guardian