Film

Can You Ever Forgive Me?

Melissa McCarthy plays a washed-up biographer who forges letters from dead authors to pay her bills, dragging her best friend into a beautifully observed crime. It's funny and heartbreaking in equal measure, a character study disguised as a caper. For anyone who likes their con artists complicated and their comedies smart.

TMDb rating3.4

Should you watch it?

Watch it if you like character studies where a prickly, unlikable protagonist and a louche sidekick share a gentle, rueful chemistry, and you enjoy dry humour sitting beside real loneliness.

Skip it if the pace is deliberately unhurried and the comedy is small and bitter, so if you want plot momentum or warmth from the central figure, it may frustrate you.

What it asks of you: Mostly quiet rooms and long stretches of watching someone work and sulk, humour arriving in sharp flashes; at 106 minutes it rewards patience over speed.

Not sure? Find tonight's pick in a minute.

If you liked this

The Wolf of Wall Street2013

A charismatic fraudster's elaborate schemes and eventual unraveling, told with energy and dark humor. Features excellent support from an ensemble cast who ground the excess with real humanity.

But Nearly three hours long, indulgent in its depiction of excess, and the protagonist is thoroughly unlikeable in ways that aren't always interesting rather than instructive.

The Wolf of Wall Street poster

I, Daniel Blake2016

A portrait of someone ground down by systems indifferent to their worth, finding dignity and connection anyway. Quietly devastating but never manipulative, with genuine warmth between characters.

But The pacing is deliberate and the tone is serious throughout. If you want momentum or levity, this will feel slow and punishing.

I, Daniel Blake poster

Godless2017

A woman trying to build a fresh life in a town run by women, only to have her past catch up with her. Gorgeous cinematography and deeply felt character work beneath the Western trappings.

But The narrative sometimes prioritizes mood over plot momentum. Some viewers find the pacing meandering, and the romance elements may frustrate those wanting more crime story.

Godless poster

Not sure tonight? Get a pick in a minute, starting from Can You Ever Forgive Me?

The wildcard

Something you would not have found on your own.

I'm Thinking of Ending Things2020

Both use mundane, trapped situations—a car ride, financial desperation—to excavate something true and painful about people trying to maintain a version of themselves the world won't accept.

A woman meets her boyfriend's parents on a drive home, and reality fractures in unsettling ways. Charlie Kaufman's direction creates mounting dread from ordinary conversation; the strangeness creeps up on you.

But Abstract and deliberately confusing, it resists plot clarity and offers no neat answers. The final act demands patience and interpretation; some viewers will find it pretentious or infuriating.

I'm Thinking of Ending Things poster
More like this (8)

The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel2017

A woman reinvents herself as a stand-up comic in 1950s New York, with brilliant dialogue and real stakes beneath the sparkle. McCarthy and Grant's dynamic mirrors that playful, desperate energy.

But The show is relentlessly upbeat and glossy; if you prefer grittier storytelling, the candy-colored production can feel airless.

The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel poster

Nightcrawler2014

Jake Gyllenhaal plays a desperate drifter who becomes a news videographer, chasing violence for profit. Deeply unsettling character study about ambition and amorality with a perfect performance.

But Relentlessly bleak and morally empty. The film offers no rest or redemption, and the protagonist's behavior becomes increasingly hard to watch.

Nightcrawler poster

The Hustle2019

Two con artists compete to fleece a tech billionaire. Light, fizzy, and genuinely fun, with a pace that never lets you think too hard about the moral questions.

But It's almost defiantly shallow. If you want depth or consequences, this prioritizes laughs and style over substance.

The Hustle poster

A Prophet2009

A young man imprisoned for a violent crime learns to navigate prison politics and rise through cunning and ruthlessness. Tense, beautifully made, and morally complex throughout.

But Subtitled, French-language, and set entirely in a brutal prison environment. The bleakness and unflinching violence may exhaust rather than entertain some viewers.

A Prophet poster

Fleabag2016

A selfish, broke woman in London stumbles through life, lying, stealing, and hurting people she loves. Hilarious and heartbreaking, with a protagonist you shouldn't like but absolutely do.

But The fourth-wall breaking takes time to adjust to, and the protagonist's behavior is genuinely terrible. If you need characters to be likeable, this won't work.

Fleabag poster

Ocean's Eight2018

An all-female heist crew pulls off an audacious theft at the Met Gala. Stylish, funny, and pure entertainment with excellent chemistry and no pretense to be anything more.

But It's fundamentally a lightweight caper with no thematic depth. If you want substance or consequence, you're watching the wrong film.

Ocean's Eight poster

Synecdoche, New York2008

Both center on artists whose work becomes indistinguishable from fraud—the line between authenticity and performance collapses entirely. Both protagonists are talented people whose desperation corrupts their craft.

Philip Seymour Hoffman plays a theater director building an increasingly elaborate play-within-play that mirrors his own unraveling life. Dizzyingly inventive, sad, and formally ambitious in ways that feel earned.

But It's genuinely confusing and self-indulgent. Some find it brilliant; others find it a three-hour indulgence in pretense with no payoff beyond its own cleverness.

Synecdoche, New York poster

Happy as Lazzaro2018

Both films are fundamentally about kindness and friendship sustaining people through systems designed to crush them. Both feature displaced people living off the margins, where ordinary morality becomes a luxury they can't afford.

An impossibly kind peasant man in rural Italy stumbles through a village and its schemes, unchanged and unjaded by cruelty around him. Strange, enchanting, and shot in dusty golds. Italian-language with deadpan humor.

But The pacing is slow and the logic is elliptical. If you need conventional plot momentum or character arcs, this will feel frustratingly static and bizarre.

Happy as Lazzaro poster

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Ingrid Goes West