Broken English is about putting the record straight, as we celebrate Marianne Faithfull, the woman, the artist, and the pioneer. It’s about separating tabloid-created memories from the truth, and asking why women continue to be overshadowed by men in the arts, music, and film.
On the 30th January 2025, Marianne Faithfull left the stage aged seventy-eight. Her six-decade career was marked by love, rebellion, defiance and artistry. She survived drug addiction, a battle with cancer and an induced COVID-19 coma, unlike her long-time friend Hal Willner. She was a fighter, a visionary, and a woman who never held back from expressing her views or from honestly interrogating her own battles.
It was this honesty that saw tabloid newspapers hone in on her. Over many years, following a police raid on Keith Richards’ house, where she was photographed by paparazzi nude, wrapped in only a fur rug, the ’60s press coloured the public view of Faithfull through blatant misogyny. They painted her as being nothing more than the “girlfriend of Mick Jagger” and dismissed her creative talent, as they talked only of her body and looks.
Things didn’t get much better as the 70s and 80s came into view, and interviewers focused on her “wild days” and her prior drug addiction, without ever asking about the experiences that led to her breakdown. Yet Faithfull continued to break boundaries in music from her album ‘Broken English’ to 2018’s ‘Negative Capability’. She collaborated with artists such as Bob Dylan, David Bowie, Lou Reed, Nick Cave, and Damon Albarn, and starred alongside notable actors such as Glenda Jackson, Mark Rylance, and Kirsten Dunst, among others.
In her final on-screen appearance, Marianne appears alongside Tilda Swinton, George MacKay, Edith Bowman and Zawe Ashton in Iain Forsyth and Jane Pollard’s unconventional and innovative documentary Broken English. Set within the fictional Ministry for Not Forgetting, overseen by Swinton and MacKay as the lead interviewer, Forsyth and Pollard explore the importance of excavating truth from forged memories as they examine how the press and media can misrepresent and perpetuate an image not aligned with fact.
It’s a fascinating set-up that honours Faithfull’s rebellious spirit, creative energy, and maverick tendencies. Here, in a warehouse of stored and catalogued memories, we explore Faithfull’s life, work, and legacy through poignant clips, emotional musical performances, painful newspaper clippings, and beautiful, honest, and informative conversations with Faithfull, led brilliantly by MacKay.
Broken English is about putting the record straight, as we celebrate the woman, the artist, and the pioneer. It’s about separating tabloid-created memories from the truth, and asking why women continue to be overshadowed by men in the arts, music, and film. As the film closes, Nick Cave and Warren Ellis come together with Faithfull for what would be her final performance. Her unmistakably husky voice sings ‘Misunderstanding’ accompanied by her friends and artistic collaborators, and I defy anyone not to shed a tear. Despite being on oxygen throughout her interview and requiring breaks to catch her breath, she manages to sing one last song, and there’s no more fitting a conclusion to the life of a pioneering musician, misunderstood poet, and visionary artist than that.
Broken English screened at the BFI London Film Festival and will arrive in cinemas in early 2026.
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