The star inherits Jodie Comer's Tony-winning role as a successful barrister turned plaintiff in a sexual assault case, but Susanna White's film of the stage hit falls a bit flat.
By Guy Lodge
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Film Critic
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Courtesy Image When a successful stage play is transferred to the screen, the typical concern is how much to “open it out” for the new medium: too little, and you wonder why they bothered; too much, and you lose the electric intimacy that galvanized audiences in the first place. It’s to the credit of “Prima Facie,” director Susanna White’s earnestly impassioned film of Australian playwright Suzie Miller’s recent West End and Broadway hit, that anyone unacquainted with the material would hardly guess that it originated as a one-woman show. Set in the lofty, intricately hierarchical world of London law, it feels convincingly populated, with a clear, embedded sense of place; it moves at a decent clip, only giving into stagy speechifying in the final stretch.
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