SHIRLEY

 Elisabeth Moss, like Jennifer Jason Leigh before her, is fast becoming one of those 'actresses' actresses', happy to appear in critically successful but commercially ignored movies, usually made independently. Her latest is Josephine Decker's "Shirley" in which she plays the novelist Shirley Jackson, author of 'The Haunting of Hill House' and Decker, as you may know, is one of the newer directors, praised for her ability to draw exceedingly strong performances from her actors. "Shirley", then, is an actor's piece as well as a highly unconventional biopic.

It's also a period piece, (it's set in the 1940's), and thanks to Sturla Brandth Grovien's luminous cinematography and Sue Chan and Kirby Feagan's production design it looks it. Knowing nothing about Shirley Jackson's life I have no idea if any of this happened but Decker's treatment suggests this is a work of pure fiction based on a real person. Moss is, as always, terrific in the title role as is Michael Stuhlbarg as her cheating husband. The plot revolves around a young married couple who become Shirley's initially unwelcome houseguests. As the wife, Odessa Young is outstanding though Logan Lerman is given little to do as her ambitious husband.

Shirley herself is probably alcoholic and clearly has mental issues and she likes to treat her guests in much the same way as Martha did in "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf", (like George, her husband is a professor), and while she refrains from seducing Lerman she does develop a kind of lesbian attachment to Young's pregnant wife. She also has a morbid fascination with the disappearance of a young female student who becomes the subject of her next book. This is also Decker's most accessible film to date, a perfectly realised psychodrama that could have come from the pen of Jackson herself and hopefully it will attract a larger audience that Decker is used to.