Six must-see films you won’t want to miss this November.

From haunting explorations of marriage and identity to deep dives into love and obsession, and even a soul-stirring opera performance, November promises to be a month of cinematic excellence. Here’s a sneak peek at what’s in store for your November film nights!

FOE

Starting Nov 2

From visionary filmmaker Garth Davis, director of the Academy Award-Nominated Lion and based on the book by best-selling author Ian Reid, Foe stars Academy Award nominees Saoirse Ronan and Paul Mescal in this haunting exploration of marriage and identity set in an uncertain world.

Hen & Junior farm a secluded piece of land that has been in Junior’s family for generations, but their quiet life is thrown into turmoil when an uninvited stranger shows up at their door with a startling proposal.

Set in the near future, after severe climate change has decimated the Earth’s agriculture, Hen (Saoirse Ronan) and Junior (Paul Mescal) live on a secluded yet struggling farm. One day, a stranger named Terrance (Aaron Pierre) disrupts their routine existence with an extraordinary proposition: that Junior go to space for several years to assist in the piloting of a program that helps transition humanity away from living on the deteriorating Earth. In addition, the program will supply a robot version of Junior to watch over Henrietta in his absence. The couple must grapple with this life-changing decision, weighing up the fate of their marriage with that of the human race itself.

Based on the novel by award-winning science fiction author Iain Reid, Foe is directed by Garth Davis, and co-written by Davis and Reid, Foe’s mesmerising imagery and persistent questions about the nature of humanity (and artificial humanity) bring the not-too-distant future to luminous life.

SALTBURN

Staring Nov 2

Featuring a star studded supporting cast, including Rosamund Pike, Carrey Mulligan, and Richard E. Grant, Saltburn is a darkly luscious portrait of obsession and visceral wanting.

Struggling to find his place at Oxford University, student Oliver Quick finds himself drawn into the world of the charming and aristocratic Felix Catton, who invites him to Saltburn, his eccentric family’s sprawling estate, for a summer never to be forgotten. With its nods to writers such as Evelyn Waugh and Alan Hollinghurst, and its shots of sprawling country estates, Saltburn is a quintessentially British film.

From Academy Award-winning filmmaker Emerald Fennell (Promising Young Woman) comes this beautifully wicked tale of privilege and desire. A tall drink of Evelyn Waugh spiked with Patricia Highsmith bitters, Fennell’s sophomore feature boasts a distinctive, splashy look for its demented critique of pomp and privilege among England’s elitist upper class; Picture Brideshead Reduced to Ashes by Tom Ripley.

REVIEWS

“Not for the faint of heart… viscerally compelling and unafraid to luxuriate in its own elegant weirdness. Its endless visual and literary layers will bring its ardent admirers back to it again and again… a triumph of the cinema of excess.” Entertainment Weekly

“A creeping mood piece… [full of] slink and sex and mounting dread… Pike, Keoghan, Elordi and the rest of the cast are in such fine command of themselves, deftly deploying arch physicality [and] piquantly delivering a parade of tart lines.” Vanity Fair

FINGERNAILS

Starting Nov 2

Anna increasingly suspects that her relationship with her longtime partner may not actually be the real thing. She secretly embarks on a new assignment working at a mysterious institute that claims to be able to prove the presence of romantic love in couples. Funny and ultimately heartwrenching, Fingernails pries open the meaning of love in this lo-fi sci-fi flick.

A scientific test has been invented to determine if two people are truly in love, using fingernails from a couple and a fancy machine. Anna (Jessie Buckley, Men, I’m Thinking of Ending Things) and her boyfriend Ryan (Jeremy Allen White, from hit TV series The Bear) took the test three years ago, with positive results, but Anna still finds herself drawn to the test and what it means. She takes a job at the Institute where the tests are administered, working with Amir (Riz Ahmed, The Sound of Metal, Nightcrawler) to help couples deepen their connection, and starts to find herself wondering what love even is. Director Christos Nikou turns the premise into a subtle meditation on how different every partnership’s story is — how love shifts and changes depending on who’s in the relationship — and the result is both kind and thought-provoking.

REVIEWS

“A wise, tender sci-fi romance… director Christos Nikou brings everyday human melancholy to a potentially outlandish premise in his calmly controlled, beautifully played second feature.” Variety

“Creatively scratches a philosophical itch… Dismantling the idea of romance as a goalpost in ways that are at once fantastic and plain, Fingernails moves between daytime workplace surrealism and revelatory nighttime conversations.” The Hollywood Reporter

“A whimsical, metaphorical exploration of love’s absurdity… the storytelling’s unfussy elegance helps sell Nikou’s message about the messy vitality of true love. Along the way, the director skewers the conventions of romantic comedies.” Screen Daily

METOPERA23: Dead Man Walking

Screening Nov 11 & 12

Dead Man Walking is the first of three Met premieres presented this season. The story is adapted from Sister Helen Prejean’s haunting memoir about her fight for the soul of a condemned murderer, later made a household name by the critically acclaimed film starring Sean Penn and Susan Sarandon.

The opera is by American composer Jake Heggie, with a libretto by Tony and Emmy Award–winning playwright Terrence McNally. Since its 2000 premiere, Heggie’s masterpiece has become the most-performed contemporary opera of the past 20 years.

World-renowned, Grammy Award–winning mezzo-soprano Joyce DiDonato stars as Sister Helen, alongside bass-baritone Ryan McKinny as death-row inmate Joseph De Rocher, soprano Latonia Moore as Sister Rose, and legendary mezzo-soprano Susan Graham—who sang Helen Prejean in the opera’s world premiere—as De Rocher’s mother. Met Music Director Yannick Nézet-Séguin, a champion of new works, conducts.

The new production is by Tony Award–winning director Ivo van Hove (who makes his highly anticipated Met directorial debut with Don Giovanni in 2023).

KILLERS OF THE FLOWER MOON

Starting Nov 2

Martin Scorsese’s highly-anticipated adaptation of David Grann’s broadly lauded book is a sobering appraisal of America’s relationship with Indigenous peoples and yet another artistic zenith for the director.

Killers of the Flower Moon details a little-known but devastating chapter in American history known as the Osage Reign of Terror, a period of five years from 1921 to 1926, during which upwards of twenty Osage Native Americans were murdered in cold blood for access to their valuable shares of oil money.

The Osage reservation just outside of Pawhuska, Oklahoma, sits atop one of the largest oil deposits in the U.S. The land is protected under tribal law, which also endows each member of the tribe a headright (a share of the mineral trust), making the Osage the wealthiest group of people in the country per capita by the early 1920s. As white Americans begin hearing sensationalised tales of the Osage’s wealth, many become indignant — and some living in the towns on and around the Osage reservation seek to dispatch members of the tribe through violence in order to inherit their fortunes.

The attacks on the Osage are so brazen that the bureau of investigation —not yet known under its eventual moniker, the FBI — is forced to intervene. The bureau, which has just come under the control of a young J. Edgar Hoover, hopes to use the notoriety of the case to establish a name for the organisation and strengthen the power of federal investigators.

As the bureau works to solve the crimes, federal agents enlist outlaw informants—bootleggers, moonshiners, cattle rustlers, and worse—to aid in the investigation, and meanwhile get to know the bustling but deeply corrupt world of the Osage reservation boomtowns.

Killers of the Flower Moon teams Leonardo DiCaprio once again with Scorsese mainstay Robert De Niro, and also stars Lily Gladstone in a glowing, break-out performance.

REVIEWS

“It becomes a Martin Scorsese film, and there can be no higher praise.” Sight & Sound

“Both a staggering piece of cinema and an urgent social probe and trial that is universal despite its historic and cultural specificity.” The New Indian Express

“This is in part a movie about how the bootstrapping American ethic lends itself to organized crime among the enterprising and in part an uneasily self-reflective questioning of turning people’s real-life trauma into entertainment. It’s magnificent.” Vox

“A superbly performed descent into a nightmarish chapter in the history of American capitalism.” Film Companion

BFF23: One Life

British Film Festival Season: Nov 1-29

In 1938, Nicholas Winton, a mild-mannered British stockbroker became increasingly unsettled by the news of what was happening in continental Europe. After a spur-of-the-moment decision to join friends in Prague to help a growing number of refugees, his life and the lives of hundreds of Jewish children facing the threat of Hitler’s regime changed forever.

Sir Anthony Hopkins masterfully portrays the deeply humble and reclusive Winton of the 1980s. When asked to declutter his office, Nicholas uncovers the long-buried folders noting names of all children he saved, sparking memories of his wartime experiences. Jumping between past and present, this scrapbook triggers a series of events that culminate in a celebration of his life-saving achievements when the BBC invites him to a television program with surprising consequences.

A story that deeply resonates in our time, as we continue to grapple with war, refugee crises, and growing antisemitism. One Life offers a moving portrait and a reminder of how one person can make a difference.

REVIEWS

“One of Hopkins’ best performances from the last few years” – Hollywood Reporter

Attribution: lunapalace.com.au