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Hard Truths quickly shows us how Pansy (Marianne Jean-Baptiste – The Book of Clarence) is not a morning person, or any sort of person, as she’s an angry, bossy moo, especally getting startled if anyone wakes her up when she’s in a deep sleep.
However, as someone who has a rule of there being no outdoor shoes on carpet in my house, I suddenly wondered if she was my ideal woman, when as soon as husband Curtley (David Webber) wanders in after a day’s work (installing a new, huge water cyclinder, despite combi boilers being all the rage), without having taken them off, she’s right on it!
However, she also slams her son, Moses (Tuwaine Barrett – The Witchfinder), for laying about in bed and not getting a job… then SHE sits about and watches A Place in the Sun. Okay, I do enjoy that, especially if Laura Hamilton’s presenting… Similarly, she complains how, at the age of 22, he eats peanut butter and jam. So do I! And I’m over 50!
Amongst many other times when she makes her presence felt, she criticises a female neighbour for having a “fat baby“, and how its coat has pockets: “What does he need pockets for? What’s he going to carry? A knife?!”
Plus, there’s a corker when Gary Beadle – who I remember as Paul Trueman in Eastenders, yet is just referred to here as Irate Motorist – wants her car park space, since the rest of it is full and she’s just sat there, despite having finished. Hence, when she bellows, “Your sperm is all backed up!”, he retorts, “And none of it’s for you!”
The question is, though: Why is she so angry? Apparently, this is writer/director Mike Leigh‘s interpretation of clinical depression, but there’s zero precise indication of that, nor does she have that confirmed at any point. She just constantly moans that she’s “tired“.
Okay, so she’s had a rough run of things, certainly with her and sister Chantelle’s (Michele Austin – This Is Going To Hurt) mother having died five years earlier (and mine has only just been gone four years), I don’t start kicking off at people. It’s nice to be nice!
Hence, at this poignant time, when they’re all round Chantelle’s house on Mother’s Day, along with her daughters, Kayla (Ani Nelson) and Aleisha (Sophia Brown – I Am Danielle), she just sits there with a right face on.
I felt that something had to give in the end, but while Hard Truths is largely very good… (yes, this last bit mentions the end of the film, so may be considered a spoiler, but this film is not exactly a whodunit.
As an aside, while Jo Martin is cast as “Nurse Salon Client”, Mike Leigh missed a trick by casting her as Pansy’s Doctor!
Also, I didn’t check the trailer beforehand, and wasn’t aware of the film’s aspect ratio, assuming a standard 1.85:1 for a Mike Leigh movie, but it’s 2.39:1! And it’s well-used. However, as Odeon’s usual “It’s Time…” appears, just before the film begins, I saw the screen zoom in from 1.85:1 to 2.39:1 in readyness of such a ratio, and assumed they’d made a mistake. Thankfully, not this time.
NOTE: There are no mid- or post-credit scenes.
Hard Truths is in cinemas now, and is available to pre-order on Blu-ray and DVD, ahead of its release date TBA.
Detailed specs:
Cert: 
Running time: 97 minutes
Release date: January 31st 2025
Studio: Studiocanal UK
Aspect Ratio: 2.39:1
Cinema: Odeon Trafford Centre
Rating: 8/10
Director: Mike Leigh
Producers: Georgina Lowe
Screenplay: Mike Leigh
Music: Gary Yershon
Cast:
Pansy: Marianne Jean-Baptiste
Chantelle: Michele Austin
Curtley: David Webber
Moses: Tuwaine Barrett
Kayla: Ani Nelson
Aleisha: Sophia Brown
Virgil: Jonathan Livingstone
Irate Motorist: Gary Beadle
Nurse Salon Client: Jo Martin
Smoking Salon Client: Llewella Gideon
Supermarket Customers: Diveen Henry, Bryony Miller
Cashier: Ashna Rabheru
Nicole: Samantha Spiro
Kayla’s Colleague: Syrus Lowe
Aleisha’s Supervisor: Naana Agyei-Ampadu
Furniture Assistant: Alice Bailey Johnson
Doctor: Ruby Bentall
Reviewer of movies, videogames and music since 1994. Aortic valve operation survivor from the same year. Running DVDfever.co.uk since 2000. Nobel Peace Prize winner 2021.