Eva Vitija

Loving Highsmith

Edition 2022

Artists on Film

83' - 2022 - Documentary - Dialogue: German, French, English

Director: Eva Vitija Composer: Noël Akchoté With: Patricia Highsmith, Marijane Meaker, Monique Buffet, Gwendoline Christie, Tabea Blumenschein, Annina Butterworth

Docs LGBTQ+

Loving Highsmith lovingly leads you through Patricia Highsmith's long-hidden relationships, her (double) life and most famous work. A personal portrait of the successful author who found in writing a substitute for the life she could not lead.

Famous for her psychological thrillers such as the one about the unscrupulous conman Tom Ripley, Patricia Highsmith touched countless hearts with the unique novel The Price of Salt, adapted by Todd Haynes into the film Carol. The only novel in which Highsmith wrote openly about a lesbian romance was partly based on her own life. Loving Highsmith, a documentary portrait, shows her often tumultuous love affairs to explore how they shaped her into the writer you know and the woman you still know too little about ... Director Eva Vitija provides an intimate look through excerpts from Highsmith's diaries and notes, testimonies from former partners and close family members, carefully interwoven with fragments from five of the many film adaptations: Carol, Strangers on a Train, Plein soleil, Der amerikanische Freund and The Talented Mr. Ripley.

“In centering the writer’s sexuality in her lively and captivating documentary Loving Highsmith, filmmaker Eva Vitija does a great service not only to fans of Highsmith’s, but to all of queer history.” - IndieWire