'Lee' Reviews: Kate Winslet Anchors Film that "struggles to match her sense of urgency"

         On September 27, 2024, Roadside Attractions and Vertical released 'Lee', which has received a mixed reception from critics, currently holding at 64% on Rotten Tomatoes alongside a Critics Consensus that reads, "Kate Winslet's gripping performance in the title role helps elevate Lee beyond its disappointingly conventional biopic trappings." The ensemble cast includes Kate Winslet, Andy Samberg, Marion Cotillard, Josh O'Connor, Andrea Riseborough, and Alexander Skarsgård. Read the full review round-up below.

        Joey Magidson of Awards Radar says, "Too many people have never heard of Lee Miller. In the past decade or so, the model turned war photographer began to get a moment in the sun, but it has taken until now for a biopic to come together. Now, we have one in Lee and it’s a throwback film, for better and worse. It’s elegant and stacked with strong actors, but with a sense of eating your vegetables that other biopics have been able to shake of late. The good outweighs the bad, but it’s close. Lee lives and dies with its lead performance. Watching Miller come to life through Kate Winslet, who also produces and truly shepherded this story into existence, is actually very compelling. She’s too good an actress not to ace this role, and she’s incredibly invested, but the overall project struggles to match her sense of urgency."

       G. Allen Johnson of San Francisco Chronicle notes, "Lee,” based on Antony Penrose’s biography of his mother, “The Lives of Lee Miller,” is an interesting look at an artist whose true importance, unfortunately, became apparent only many years after her death."

Photo by Felipe Bustilo on Unsplash

       Saskia Baron of The Arts Desk was less impressed, stating, "Anyone who has seen Lee Miller’s photographs – those taken of her in the 1920s when she was a dazzling American beauty, those she took as a World War Two photojournalist – and read about her extraordinary life will have thought: this will make a great biopic. Unfortunately, it’s precisely because those photographs have become so familiar that Lee was destined to be a frustrating film. We know what Miller looked like from the pictures taken of her by the likes of Edward Steichen, Man Ray, and David Scherman. It’s hard not to have those images in mind when watching the also familiar Kate Winslet portray Miller on screen. It's hard, as well, to be convinced by the movie, especially the 1977 scenes in which Winslet plays the 70-year-old Miller with none-too-subtle ageing make-up." Concluding, "The film’s biggest problem is the weary framing device that has a young man interviewing the ageing Miller about her life. Even the twist at the end, which reveals that the interviewer (played by Josh O’Connor with his trademark pout) isn’t some opportunistic journalist, doesn’t make these scenes work. It's best to stick to the excellent documentaries that have been made about Miller, her photographs, and the fascinatiing books about her written by Anthony Penrose, her son."

        Alex Sims of Time Out praises the film, stating, "As an argument for how urgent and powerful photography can be, and the debt we owe Miller for the lengths she went to take those images, Lee wins hands down."