kate winslet

“There’s so much life in a person’s eyes, right up until the moment that there isn’t”, says Lee Miller in Ellen Kuras’s new bio-pic Lee. A historic war photographer and iconoclastic personality, Miller captured both sides of that truth with her camera, and her work is a lasting testament to her fearlessness and artistry. She captured some of the most indelible images from the decade that spanned before, during, and after World War II, including uniquely expressing the challenges for women in the war, as well as the tragedy and horror of the holocaust. Award-winning cinematographer Kuras makes her narrative directorial debut with Lee, which tells the story of the decade roughly between 1935 and 1945 from Lee Miller’s perspective.

For those who don’t know much about the fascinating life of Lee Miller, Lee will immediately send you in search for books, documentaries and archives. That alone is a strong endorsement for any biopic. Anchored by a gritty performance by Kate Winslet as the model turned photographer whose work as a war correspondent during World War II yielded some of the first and still chilling images from the Nazi death camps, Lee depicts a life too big for a single film. Still, director Ellen Kuras and Winslet capture Miller’s artistic curiosity and core defiance that made her a woman far ahead of her time.