Synopsis
Madeline has become an integral part of a prestigious physical theater troupe. When the workshop's ambitious director pushes the teenager to weave her rich interior world and troubled history with her mother into their collective art, the lines between performance and reality begin to blur. The resulting battle between imagination and appropriation rips out of the rehearsal space and through all three women's lives.
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Cast
- Helena HowardMadeline
- Molly ParkerEvangeline
- Miranda JulyRegina
- Okwui OkpokwasiliNurse, KK
- Sunita ManiAssistant Max
- Eva SteinmetzClaire, Woman in Pig Mask
- Felipe BonillaSantos, Cousin Elmer
- Lolo HahaAart
- Jorge Torres-TorresAlejandro, Craps
- Lisa B. TharpsLaura
Recommendations
- 100
IndieWire
In an overwhelmingly dense film that never feels as if it’s only ever doing one thing, Decker’s form never forces you to choose between the story and its very meta shadows. - 91
The Playlist
From a narrative standpoint, Decker and her three writing collaborators have fashioned a reasonably compelling story. What makes the film transcendent is how she uses the art of cinema to convey it and Howard’s phenomenal performance. - 90
Screen Daily
It’s a distinctive world that Decker and her team have created. Among this year’s coming-of-age films, it’s got to be one of the most original. But it’s also one of the more perplexing. - 90
Village Voice
Who’s telling this story? you might wonder, and therein lies the radical, breathtaking beauty of this film. Madeline’s Madeline is at once intoxicated by the world and deeply terrified of it. - 90
New York Magazine (Vulture)
Thrillingly confounding. - 83
The Film Stage
There will never be easy answers when dealing with the soul-baring act of producing truly great art, but Josephine Decker’s film is as mesmerizing a plunge into the process as one is likely to find in modern cinema. - 80
The Hollywood Reporter
Madeline’s Madeline is both heady and head-scratching. Anyone who has ever taken an acting class and witnessed the psychodramas brewed there will relate to this bubbling kettle of raw, unleashed emotions stirred up in shifting power grabs. - 80
CineVue
A display of dazzling and disorientating technique, this interior tale of a young girl’s mental disintegration is like falling through a hall of mirrors, with each performance reflecting and refracting a portion of Madeline’s personality as fantasy and reality become impossible to separate.
