Masc (2026)
I will be honest that I came to Masc with more than a critic's interest. My own son is autistic, and a film that genuinely inhabits the perspective of an autistic man, rather than observing him from the outside, is a rare and precious thing. Bertil Nilsson's debut does exactly that, with real tenderness and insight, and while it is not without its rough edges, it moved me and stayed with me. A film I am very glad exists.
It follows Robin, a queer, autistic, biracial man played with astonishing openness by Joshua Griffin, who also co-wrote the film. Across five loosely chronological chapters we watch him navigate work, friendship, the gym, sexuality and the simple daily business of being around other people, each a different arena with its own unspoken rules. One detail rang especially true: Robin quietly records people talking, studying their diction, their parlance, the accents and registers they slip into for different situations, building himself a kind of library of how to pass. It is a beautifully precise way of showing what so much of autistic life actually involves.
Because the film's real subject is masking, the exhausting, constant work many autistic people do to seem like everyone else, to fit in, to pre-empt judgement. Masc understands the cost of that, and if I have one hope for the film it is that it reaches people, autistic folk and the friends and families who love them, with a quiet but vital message: that the healthiest, happiest thing is not to perform a more acceptable self, but to be allowed to be yourself and appreciated for who you naturally are. The film never preaches it, but it is there in every frame, and it is the thing I most wanted to take my own son's hand and say.
Tonally it moves nimbly between registers, sad in places, uplifting in others, and often unexpectedly funny, which feels true to a life rather than a lesson. Griffin anchors it all with a performance so unguarded it sometimes aches, and Nilsson shoots him with patience and warmth, never gawping, always with him rather than at him.
I will admit I watched much of it with my heart in my mouth. The whole way through I carried a low, familiar dread that someone would take advantage of Robin's good nature, and once or twice that fear is realised. For me that landed hard, because it is the daily worry of any parent of an autistic child, the knowledge that you cannot shield them every minute of every day. That the film made me feel that so keenly is a measure of how truthfully it is drawn.
Three and a half stars. Masc is a warm, perceptive and quietly important film, an autistic story told from the inside with honesty and love, carried by a remarkable Joshua Griffin. It is a little loose and episodic, and will not grab everyone, but it is doing something that too few films even attempt, and doing it with grace. For me, it was unmissable.
Related on Movies With Macca
More from Country United Kingdom: The Red Shoes (1948), The Driver (1978), Interstellar (2014)
More from the 2020s: All That's Left of You (2025), The Whale (2022), Look Back (2024)
More drama: I Will Be Alright (2026), Delisted (2026), Lady (2026)
