Loving Highsmith

Switzerland / Germany 2022, 83 min, English, French and German, Hebrew & English subtitles

All 22 of Patricia Highsmith’s thriller novels were bestsellers, and many were adapted into hit films (Strangers on a Train, The Talented Mr. Ripley). That is, all but one: “Carol,” a lesbian romance novel, the first of its kind to give both its heroines a happily-ever-after against everything 1950s America had stood for. Highsmith had written it under a pseudonym. She grew up in a moralist Texan family with a dysfunctional mother and had to go all the way to Europe to live as her secret true self. The film features excerpts from her unpublished diaries and interviews with Highsmith and women who had been her romantic partners. “She was easy to love,” one of them says, “too bad it was such a great sin back then.”

Arts and Culture Gender Icons International Films LGBTQ+ Literature Women Directors Official Website