52 Tuesdays

A year is a long time when you’re a woman going through gender reassignment. But it probably feels even longer when you’re an already-confused teenage girl and your mum’s about to be called ‘James’. Shot, like a micro-‘Boyhood’, over the 52 consecutive Tuesdays which provide its title, this Sundance-garlanded Aussie drama brings deft emotional nuance to the seemingly inexhaustibly complex relationship between individual identity and family ties.

You’d think the unusual subject matter of female-to-male transition would grab the limelight here. But while non-professional Del Herbert-Jane proves utterly authentic in this key role, the story chooses to side with mesmerising, androgynously gamine debutant Tilda Cobham-Hervey as the high-schooler daughter, whose sexual uncertainties and raw, unformed emotions shift and weave according to her mum’s ongoing personal transformation.

It’s a beguiling trajectory, as secrets, evasions and revealing iPhone footage contribute to exacerbating insecurities. And while the segmented structure often feels more of a duty than a dramatic necessity, first-time director Sophie Hyde’s mazy, impulsive but sympathetic approach is always true to her characters’ exasperating but ultimately affecting pathway towards hard-earned self knowledge.