Sienna Miller

Under the floorboards in Horizon: An American Saga - Chapter 1 (2024), Sienna Miller’s Frances Kittredge holds her daughter while boots cross above them. There is nothing vague about what matters here: keeping the child hidden through the attack on the settlement. We were frightened for them because Kevin Costner and editor Miklos Wright let the ordeal continue without cutting away to give us a breather. J. Michael Muro shoots the attack low among the settlers, mostly by the light of burning roofs. The film leaves too many stories unfinished, but Miller makes this early stretch worth the attention.

Her breakthrough came with Layer Cake (2004) and Alfie (2004), followed by the lead role of Edie Sedgwick in Factory Girl (2006). The Girl (2012), in which she played Tippi Hedren, marked a return before the supporting parts in Foxcatcher (2014) and American Sniper (2014). Those two films make the recurring limitation of her casting plain: she is the wife in dramas chiefly concerned with men. She can make those parts convincing, but we would like her to be given more to do than respond.

Foxcatcher is the stronger recommendation, and her restrained work as Nancy Schultz fits Bennett Miller’s patient direction. Editors Stuart Levy, Conor O’Neill and Jay Cassidy give the performances room to develop, letting us notice how the men seek one another’s approval. That helps Miller’s subtlety register, even in a part with less room than the men are given. The patience sometimes becomes a fault: the cast has made a relationship clear and the film keeps contemplating it.

We would welcome more roles that let her set events in motion. Three hours of Horizon is too much to recommend for her alone. Start with Foxcatcher, but be prepared for a film that occasionally takes longer than its actors need.