‘Hedda’ Review: DaCosta and Thompson Offer Up Their Own Spin on Ibsen

October 20, 2025

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A still of 3 women in a movie called Hedda (CREDIT: Parisa Taghizadeh/Amazon Content Services LLC)

Starring: Tessa Thompson, Imogen Poots, Nina Hoss, Tom Bateman, Nicholas Pinnock, Finbar Lynch, Mirren Mack, Jamael Westman, Saffron Hocking, Kathryn Hunter

Director: Nia DaCosta

Running Time: 107 Minutes

Rating: R for The Typical Party Vices, Including a Little Bit of Skin

Release Date: October 22, 2025 (Select Theaters)/October 29, 2025 (Amazon Prime Video)

What’s It About?: By all outward appearances, Hedda Gabler (Tessa Thompson) seems to have a pretty charmed life. She’s got a decent husband (Tom Bateman), she lives in a massive house,  and she gets to host some wild shindigs. But there’s a powder keg just waiting to be lit. And it all goes kaboom over the course of one of those bacchanals. That’s because on that night, a couple of ladies with their own agendas (Nina Hoss and Imogen Poots) return to force Hedda to reap what she’s been sowing. And so, forbidden romance, professional jealousies, and general pettiness all converge for a deadly disaster that none of the guests will soon forget.

What Made an Impression?: The Scandinavia of It All: 2025’s Hedda is just the latest in a long line of adaptations of the 1891 Henrik Ibsen play Hedda Gabler. Before watching this version, I only knew it by name and was totally unfamiliar with the plot. But I have encountered Ibsen’s most famous work (A Doll’s House), so I had some idea of what he’s all about. Writer-director Nia DaCosta has fully queered up the story, although I wouldn’t have been surprised if that element were already present in the original. Which is to say, it’s a natural fit.
We’re All Trapped: If I had to select one word to sum up Hedda, it would be … “claustrophobic.” There’s no escaping this party! Or maybe there is, though it would probably require these characters to totally redefine their perspectives of their current life situations. As the viewer, I felt similarly boxed in. If you find yourself in the same boat as me, you could always walk out of the theater or press stop on your remote. That is, unless you relish anxiety-inducing moviegoing experiences.
She’s So Petty: Tessa Thompson is a pretty dang great actor, and Hedda only reinforces that truth. But her version of the titular scamp (and perhaps most versions) is not a very pleasant person to be around. In fact, I would even go so far as to call her a sociopath. Maybe if I had prepared myself a bit more before going to know what I would be getting into, I might have been entertained by all of her manipulative behavior. But only to a point. Ultimately, this is one of those movies that I found kind of middling, even though I got the sense that the people making it probably did exactly what they wanted to do.

Hedda is Recommended If You Like: Hot messes throughout the decade

Grade: 2.5 out of 5 Secrets

‘TÁR’ Pulls You Down the Rabbit Hole of Egomania

October 6, 2022

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Covered in TÁR (CREDIT: Courtesy of Focus Features)

Starring: Cate Blanchett, Noémie Merlant, Nina Hoss, Sophie Kauer, Julian Glover, Allan Corduner, Mila Bogojevic, Mark Strong

Director: Todd Field

Running Time: 157 Minutes

Rating: R for A Few Swears and Some Weird Incidental Nudity

Release Date: October 7, 2022 (Theaters)

What’s It About?: Lydia Tár is one of the greatest living conductors. Does that sound like a role that Cate Blanchett was born to play? Todd Field apparently thought so, to the point that TÁR is the first movie he’s directed in sixteen years. Anyway, we’re introduced to Lydia at a live New Yorker interview, and it looks like it’s mostly going to be about her preparing for her next great orchestra performance. You know, one of those “process of genius” chronicles. But a messy personal life, and an even messier series of scandals, lurk barely underneath the surface. If you’re getting a sense that Lydia’s about to alienate all of her colleagues, friends, and family members, then you might be onto something.

What Made an Impression?: I’ve lately been reading Classical Music for Dummies, so I was all primed for TÁR to be more viscerally thrilling for me than it would have been, say, a year ago. But as it turns out, the classical setting is more or less incidental. Oh sure, there’s plenty for aficionados to dig here, as it’s likely to inspire passionate debates about the relative merits of Mahler and Bach, or someone more contemporary like Anna Thorvaldsdottir. But this is a story of the ego destroying everything else, which can happen in any high-powered artistic pursuit.

Lydia’s downfall could be read as a portrait of cancel culture, but that term is a bit too charged and complicated to be the most accurate description. For a good chunk of the movie, I found myself thinking, “She’s not guilty of exactly what she’s being accused of. Although, she is guilty of a lot.” Her instincts are to retreat, hide, get back to work, and in the process fail to acknowledge the humanity of pretty much everyone around her. What happens after that alienation? As TÁR posits, your whole world becomes warped beyond recognition, resulting in a wild fish-out-of-water conclusion and one of the most unexpectedly goofy final shots I’ve ever seen.

TÁR is Recommended If You Like: Geniuses losing it all, Finger dexterity, EGOT discussions

Grade: 3.5 out of 5 Symphonies