H is for Hawk

★★★★ The Telegraph

Based on Helen Macdonald’s bestselling memoir, Claire Foy plays a Cambridge professor as she is broken by grief. Her beloved father (Brendan Gleason) has passed. Seeking to reconnect with the nature he helped her love, she buys a goshawk, Mabel. Initially overcome and petrified of Mabel, she is aided by expert Stuart (Sam Spruell) and and her concerned mother (Lindsay Duncan) to battle her depression.

The life-transforming power of birds of prey has a high-watermark in British cinema in the form of Kes, but Philippa Lowthorpe (The Other Boleyn Girl, Misbehaviour) and Foy bring an authenticity of their own. There’s an undeniable connection between actor and raptor that makes the heart leap, drawing us into this unlikely method of healing.