US EditionH Is for Hawk True Story: Is the New Claire Foy Film Fact or Fiction?
Claire Foy portrays Helen Macdonald in a film exploring grief and recovery through falconry, featuring five goshawks and expert trainers, released January 23 in cinemas.
- On 23 January, Claire Foy stars as Helen in H Is for Hawk, co-starring Brendan Gleeson and Lindsay Duncan, adapted by Emma Donoghue and directed by Philippa Lowthorpe with Cert 12A, 115 minutes.
- Based on Helen Macdonald's memoir H is for Hawk, the film centers on grief and goshawk training, with the book optioned very soon after its 2014 publication.
- Under handlers Lloyd and Rose Buck, the production used real props like Dad's real photos and cameras, with five goshawks portraying Mabel and Plan B's Dede Gardner buying aviary-bred chicks.
- Audience reactions were intense, with audience members at screenings sobbing and Macdonald saying she sometimes felt like a ghost watching Foy, blending memory and film.
- To avoid repeating harmful depictions, the filmmakers required strict falconry standards, with Lloyd and Rose Buck ensuring proper care, while Emma Donoghue and Philippa Lowthorpe removed the TH White parallel to preserve intimacy.
16 Articles
16 Articles
Claire Foy en-raptor-ed with ‘H is for Hawk’
Claire Foy had just two weeks to bond with the carnivorous goshawks that serve as her costars in “H is for Hawk.” The British film, adapted from Helen Macdonald’s best-selling memoir, charts how Foy’s Helen sinks into a grave depression following the sudden death of her father (Brendan Gleeson). By training and bonding with a Eurasian goshawk she names Mabel, Helen ultimately recovers. Goshawks are imposing birds, twice the size of a falcon. We …
What it’s like to be played by Claire Foy
Despite my background as a Cambridge academic, I can be mind-meltingly stupid. Just before filming began for H Is for Hawk, the movie adaptation of my memoir about training a goshawk after my father’s death, the director, Philippa Lowthorpe, asked me if I would have a Zoom meeting with Claire Foy, who’d be playing me. “Of course!” I said. During the call, as Foy asked me a series of acute and perceptive questions, I kept thinking, “Wow, weird. I…
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