Winter of The Crow (15)

The always excellent Lesley Manville sees history unfold in front of her eyes in this riveting Cold War thriller.

For three decades, psychiatry professor Joan Andrews (Manville) has worked to rise to the top of her field, but as a woman, and someone from the West, her groundbreaking ideas are met with skepticism in Poland. A conference she attends in Warsaw is interrupted by protests, and she’s quickly ferreted away to a flat belonging to the parents of her handler Alina (Zofia Wichlacz). Feeling disrespected, she’s ready to pack up and go back home. But overnight, the military takes over the government, martial law is declared, the borders are closed, and Alina goes into hiding.

Joan’s journey is first physically exhausting and then morally challenging as she must figure out what she believes in and how far she’s willing to go for the greater good, an inner conflict that lands her at the feet of Tom Burke’s shady British ambassador. The story of an intrepid rebellion fighting back against an authoritarian government hasn’t ever lacked relevancy but it’s obviously an easy story to get behind at this particular moment. Don’t miss.