Claire Foy plays an academic devastated by bereavement who finds solace in a connection with a goshawk in Philippa Lowthorpe’s true-story drama H is for Hawk.
All Will Be Well
by Chris DrewH is for Hawk
3.0 out of 5.0 stars
CAUTION: Here be spoilers
Many films have portrayed people coping with severe hardship thanks to the support of animals, H is for Hawk enters this canon with a pleasing lack of schmaltz which a Hollywood version almost certainly would have drowned in.
We meet Helen (Claire Foy, First Man) transfixed by a pair of goshawks gliding around each other and excitedly calling to tell her photographer father (Brendan Gleeson, The Banshees of Inisherin).
Little does she know that this will be their final call as her mother (Lindsay Duncan, About Time) soon delivers the news of his sudden passing.
Knocked sideways, Helen is soon with family identifying her father’s body and then, in an amusing scene, being offered a themed coffin at the undertakers.
Two months later she visits Stu (Sam Spruell, Legend) and his new bird of prey revealing she’s been dreaming of a goshawk and her desire to get one. Stu expresses concern, stressing how tough they are to train, but Helen is determined.
Soon she has taken Australian friend Christine (Denise Gough, Colette) to Scotland to buy a bird, begging the seller to let her have the wilder hawk she later calls Mabel.
As Helen and Mabel grow accustomed to each other we see a number of key milestones: Mabel eating for the first time, the first time she flies back to the fist and the first time she hunts.
The hunt scene is riveting, shot like a genuine action sequence with different angles and use of slow motion intercut with Helen in hot pursuit running through the trees.
But bonding with Mabel doesn’t magically fix Helen; gradually her house becomes a mess, she doesn’t want to answer the front door and neglects her teaching responsibilities at Cambridge.
During a seminar she is delivering about Mabel, she is challenged on hunting and causing death and suddenly finds herself talking about dealing with loss to an audience.
Helen is treated for depression but accepts support from Christina and manages to give a tearful eulogy at her father’s memorial service in a typically moving scene.
Foy does a superb job of capturing Helen’s emotional journey and clearly put in the work with the bird handling as she certainly convinces. She has a lot of material to sink her teeth into.
In contrast, Duncan is largely saddled with looking concerned at the end of a phone while in the many flashback scenes Gleeson is light and bright as the wonderful late father. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-dZJyTEDcIUGough is a warm and amusing presence as the loyal friend.
Highlight of the filmmaking are beautifully captured sunrise skies with a soundtrack of birdsong and swelling strings.
The pacing could be tighter but H is for Hawk is a solid adaptation of Helen Macdonald’s memoir, a touching depiction of finding hope in the face of life changing grief.
H is for Hawk screened at the BFI LFF 2025 on 12, 13 and 18 October 2025. Above is the book trailer.
