It may sound a little silly or slight to mention, but Disney’s Young Woman and the Sea is saved from the grim pedestrianism of the Hollywood biopic by a smile. It switches on, like a lightbulb in a dark basement, across the face of its star, Daisy Ridley. As an actor, Ridley hasn’t yet been able to capitalise on her role as Rey in the Star Wars movies in the way some might have hoped (which may partially explain why she was so easily coaxed back for a freshly announced sequel). But she’s achieved a real clarity about what she can offer as an actor. That’s a rare quality for a franchise veteran.
Ridley, and that smile of hers, can champion blunt determination and vigour with a kind of starry-eyed innocence. The actor’s turn as American swimmer Gertrude Ederle, the first woman to swim the English Channel, allows us to watch a sportsperson engaged in a self-punishing pursuit, not because she’s stirred on by the auspicious weight of destiny but because it brings her genuine joy.
