Daphne

Daphne is a wisecracking wit who may just resemble women you actually know. Imagine that.

Quickly develops into something pretty remarkable, thanks mostly to the stunning performance at its center.

Peter Mackie Burns's drama is credible, delivered in a style that fully captures the feel of her world, but its story's brief time span -- a matter of days -- leaves us unsure of how much is at stake.

A character study that, much like its titular subject, refuses to conform to neat, trite expectations (as marvellously inhabited by Emily Beecham) is an appealing mess of uncertainties.

A modest but intriguing film.

Intensely inhabited by Emily Beecham, it's a performance full of jangling discord and serrated edges, capturing a woman at the exact moment when circumstances magnify her already forcefully nihilistic personality.

There's nothing neat about Mackie Burns' film: like Daphne herself, it's messy and squalid, compellingly real.

If you're a fan of Bridesmaids, Obvious Child and/or TV shows such as Girls and Fleabag, you'll feel a tingle of rapture, roughly 10 minutes into the proceedings. That feeling won't go away.

I found this an endearing story about being lost, needing to find your place in the world and realising there's no choice but to hoist yourself up by the bootstraps every now and then.

Atmospheric and startlingly well performed by the cast, this is a compelling character study. Daphne may find people largely annoying, but there's inspiration in her determination to find her way.

Hard not to like, but difficult to love.

A richly detailed character study of a 30-something Londoner (Emily Beecham) whose life is in a bit of an emotional nose-dive, something compounded by her witnessing a stabbing.