Colette

Colette (2018) is Wash Westmoreland's period drama with Keira Knightley in the title role, and you can watch it online on iFILM. A country girl from rural France is married off to a Paris literary man, and the city swallows her whole.

Her husband, known to readers simply as Willy, nudges his young wife into writing under his name. Out of that comes Claudine, a cheeky, half-autobiographical novel about a provincial girl that turns into the publishing sensation of its day. Someone else's signature sits on the cover. As the Claudine books light up Paris salons, Colette grows certain that her own pen made Willy rich and famous while leaving her nothing but the obligation to stay quiet. What follows is a fight to reclaim her name, affairs with women, and a turn on the music-hall stage. Dominic West plays Willy as a charming predator, Denise Gough is Colette's lover Missy.

Westmoreland skips the stiff costume portrait for a live-wire story about who owns the words on a page, and it lands as strikingly modern. Knightley carries it on one stubborn stare. This one's for anyone who likes their biopics sharp and unsweetened. Stream Colette (2018) online on iFILM.