The Empire Cinema sits oceanfront in a small coastal English town in the 1980s.  While times are turbulent, audiences and staff alike can find reprieve from the swirling changes in their society within the walls of the cinema and be transported to places near and far.  But there is one among them who does not indulge in the magic of the movies, Hilary (Olivia Colman), the duty manager, has an overwhelming sense of obligation and love for the cinema as her workplace, but she is also incredibly lonely.  When a new hire for the holidays, Steven (Michael Ward), shows similar passion towards the building, the two form a secret relationship, but when their affair is discovered by some of the staff, it jeopardizes Hilary’s position at the cinema. 

Sam Mendes writes and directs Empire of Light for Searchlight Pictures. The 119-minute film ticks all the boxes of modern prestige pictures – set in the turbulent 1980s, shows a growing understanding of race relations, and it is a love letter to cinema – though Mendes’ entry is anything but conventional.  It is a messy script that bites off a little more than it can chew, but the craft and the care with which the narrative is treated help to salve that.  Coleman and Ward both offer tender performances, though their relationship sparks very quickly and out of nowhere. Yet still, when their trysts are captured by Roger Deakins’ camera and poetically scored by Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross, it is hard not to get caught up in the romance of it all. 

Colman dominates the first half of the film and proves to be one of the finest actors working today.  Much like her role at the head of Maggie Gyllenhaal’s The Lost Daughter (2021), she has to communicate an entire life through her actions, her posture, and her facial expressions, and though Mendes does allow the script to ease the burden of character development far more than Gyllenhaal’s script the year before, it is more a confirmation of what we have already pieced together from Colman’s physical performance.  She moves with such a sense of sadness, finding solace in the solitude of the early mornings and late nights in the empty halls of the cinema, and it is revealed through her morphine prescription and her frequent check-ins with her doctor that she had suffered a schizophrenic break in the not-too-distant past.  Unfortunately, Mendes handles this aspect of her history, and her developments, quite clumsily, as she finds she no longer needs her medicine because her depression has been cured since she found a new purpose in life with Steven. 

That is not to discredit their relationship, but in Mendes’ rush to have them fall in love, it comes off as very strange and hollow to audiences, resigning to it more than accepting it when it becomes clear that this romance is what will drive the film.  Further, the narrative takes some interesting diversions that, while they would make the film follow a more traditional arc, it would have served the narrative better than the commentary which Mendes was trying to make.  With two screens that have fallen from use and a bar and lounge on the top floor, Empire of Light seemed initially to be the story of the revitalization of the cinema in addition to, if not in lieu of, Hilary and Steven.  Instead, the film remains a romantic drama, but Mendes, while no stranger to difficult characters, does not operate with the same precision here as his script finds Hilary more or less cured of her illness after a little bit of sun and she realizes that because it is not as “bad” as the racism which Steven faces, she needs to pull herself up and dust herself off.  There is too much care in the pages of this script towards these characters for this reasoning to be nefarious, but it is an incredibly tone-deaf conclusion even if it did want to keep the logic of the film steeped in the antiquated understanding of mental health.

Though the romance is also rough, Ward holds his own as a foil to Colman’s Hilary. He brings exuberance and a lively spark to the film, and for that reason, it is understandable why Hilary would find herself drawn to his spirit, but Mendes does not allow it to develop enough over time. Ward also brings to the narrative the struggle of growing racism that was thriving under Thatcher’s rule. Much like James Grey has faced some recent criticism over his handling of racism in 1980s America as it relates to his latest effort, Armageddon Time, Mendes does not have the benefit of memoir to hide behind as Empire of Light is a pure work of fiction. That being said, Empire of Light offers Steven a much brighter path ahead than Armageddon Time’s Johnny. One of Steven’s driving motivations is to get to university, and that goal informs much of the later arc of the film. After a second episode, Hilary returns to the hospital and Empire of Light becomes Steven’s story as he reunites with an old girlfriend, Ruby (Crystal Clark), and their much more leveled relationship is very sweet to see develop and unfold. 

The other major development at the cinema during Hilary’s absence is Neil (Tom Brooke) taking over the operation from Donald Ellis (Colin Firth), who left in disgrace when Hilary revealed their sexual arrangement in front of his wife, Brenda (Sara Stewart) at a gala premiere of Hugh Hudson’s Chariots of Fire (1981). Under Neil’s guidance, the cinema becomes a welcoming home once more for the staff that, while many remain in the background to be seen or referred to but never speaking themselves, see the cinema as a catch-all for counterculture or art-minded folk: Janine (Hannah Onslow) with her music, Frankie with his eyeliner (Roman Hayeck-Green), and Finn (Dougie Boyall) with his shoulder length hair. With this collection of people, The Empire Cinema becomes a home for the homeless, those who do not feel represented, or in Steven’s case, flat-out rejected by their neighbors. But Mendes, to his credit, with Norman (Toby Jones), the white, cis-male projectionist, is not saying that the art of cinema belongs only to the “alternative,” rather, he is saying that the cinema is a home to ideas, welcoming all of those who come with an open mind. It may seem strange to bring up identity politics in an 80’s set film, but through Mendes’ character construction and setting this film, while not contending with it directly, at the precipice of the AIDs crisis, the subtext is impossible to miss. It is unfortunate though that the script is not more careful in adding depth to these difficult characters and allowing them more nuance. The extended cast does well, even with what limited development they have to pull from the page, but it feels like a script with so much untapped potential, especially when the wider craft of score and cinematography are concerned. 

To digress a moment before closing, what makes Empire of Light so unique as a love letter to cinema is that it is not following the template of a young boy who falls in love with watching movies or making movies, but rather it follows a group of cinema workers.  Even though the Empire Cinema is only operating with half of its screen count, and the restaurant and bar on the top floor hosts only the pigeons anymore, Mendes’ cast captures the care, love, and comradery formed in this environment.  The Empire Cinema provides a much more romanticized atmosphere than the sticky purple tile and bold carpeting found in any of the 1990s era multiplexes, whose masking has long ago stopped working and booths have been silenced with the transition to digital, but even in those heavily corporatized venues, there was always some excitement in turning on the neon for the day or the sound of those first few kernels popping to life and echoing through the lobby.  There is still a pride to be found in these stewards of the experience of the cinema and it was so refreshing to see this ode dedicated to the cinema workers instead of just to the consumer-turned-creator. 

Empire of Light, remains, a difficult film to recommend as Mendes is no stranger to difficult characters, and this is no exception which is also further complicated given its structure and narrative choices. To anyone who has worked in the cinema before, it will speak to them on a very specific level which cannot be denied or ignored. While the machinations of the plot lot do leave much to be desired, there is such care and love poured into the frame, though it is far from a crowning work for the director. Beautiful to behold yet frustrating to watch, this film should be better than it is, and, had Mendes worked with a collaborator on the page, Empire of Light could reach a wider audience than just those who have shared such an intimate relationship with a cinema; those who breathe life into the empty halls and empty rooms so that imaginations can be unlocked.