Albert Nobbs

Glenn Close stars as a woman pretending to be a man so she can work as a hotel butler in mid-19th Century Dublin. She survives the crushing weight of her daily deception with a dream to save enough money to buy a business of her own one day, a dream that is achingly close to becoming a reality as the story opens. It’s certainly one of the most unique stories to come out of Hollywood in a long time, and it works primarily because of Close’s hypnotic, Oscar-nominated performance as Nobbs. It’s a performance that takes some getting used to, to be honest, because Close doesn’t depend on prosthetics or any other unnatural devices to try and trick the audience into believing she is actually a man. The performance she gives isn’t about the look; it’s all about the person inside the butler uniform as Nobbs finally lets his guard down with the people around him and goes on an incredible journey that’s romantic, funny, thought-provoking and, ultimately, tragic. By the end of it, you just feel privileged that you were allowed to come along for the ride.