Broken English Film Review: Bold & Brilliant

Part documentary, part investigative drama, and part dystopia, Broken English is a bold and brilliant movie.

The film is anything but a traditional documentary. It’s told through a fictional narrative frame: MacKay plays a kind researcher employed by a fictional organisation called the “Ministry of Not Forgetting,” headed by Tilda Swinton. For the Ministry’s very first project, MacKay conducts a series of interviews with the real Marianne Faithfull to reconstruct the singer’s life. The documentary explores her story, her music career, and her legacy through archival footage, detailed research, expert roundtables, and a series of interviews with Marianne herself. The use of this narrative device is interesting because it allows the directors to steer away from traditional documentary format, and to avoid the use of talking head interviews, re-enactments or constant voiceover to convey the necessary information to the audience. 

Broken English comments on the topic of AI through Tilda Swinton’s character. who explains that the Ministry of Not Forgetting aims to preserve memory. “The loudest opposition to our purpose comes from those who believe that AI will transform this act of not forgetting, turning memory into an all-encompassing, synthetic cloud of data,” she says, in one of the first scenes of the film, where her character explains the importance of of the Ministry of Not Forgetting and its mission. By tackling this topic, the documentary takes a decisive stand against generative AI, who only works with algorithms and numbers as opposed to the real emotions and human connections that this very film represents.

The use of archival footage is equally interesting, and one of the elements of traditional documentary filmmaking that Broken English does implement. This is cut together with the main narrative very successfully, and used to support Marianne’s interview rather than simply as a way to have the audience look at something interesting, which often happens in this genre. The acting in the film, especially from MacKay and Swinton, is also excellent, creating an original product that mixes performance with real life. By doing so, it manages to deliver an authentic and honest portrayal of its protagonist. 

While Broken English does a good job at avoiding the tried and tested formulas of the genre, its voiceover narration occasionally feels like the typical voice of God narration that we often find in documentaries, especially at the beginning of the movie even if it is framed in a new and innovative context. The film also struggles, at times, with the different narrative strands, including a roundtable of women who talk about Marianne’s career. But the most powerful moments of the entire documentary are the scenes between Faithfull and George MacKay’s character, which allow Marianne to talk about her life with disarming honesty despite – or perhaps even thanks to – the fictional frame around her interviews. 

Overall, Broken English is a bold and brilliant film that pushes the limits and conventions of documentary filmmaking. With their latest work, directors Jane Pollard and Ian Forsyth manage to find and uncover the truth by using fiction as the framework in which they operate . The movie blends reality and fiction to obtain an honest recount, making for an incredibly original and fascinating genre-bending documentary. With a touch of sadness in its final intertitles, the movie is a beautiful tribute to a woman who was often mistreated and misrepresented in her own time.

Broken English will be screened at the BFI London Film Festival on 11-18 October, 2025.