The time is 1950, and though the dark and depressed city still suffers from wartime austerities Vera brings the light.

NEWYORKER: Vera Drake

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Based on a short memoir by the talented, acid-tongued journalist Lynn Barber (first published in Granta magazine), the movie is set in 1962, when England was gradually emerging from postwar austerities and the fabled antics of swinging London were just getting under way.

NEWYORKER: An Education