“Life is tragic and life is comic,” Mike Leigh recently told Vanity Fair. “My films are tragi-comedies, always.” Since the 1960s, the British director has crafted his scripts during months of research and improvisation with his actors. Firmly anchored in reality, his latest film is no exception. Marianne Jean-Baptiste stars as Pansy, a relentlessly negative mother and a wife who takes her anxieties and pessimistic worldview out on anyone willing to give her the time of day. “You can’t go in or out of a supermarket without being harassed by those grinning, cheerful charity workers begging you for money for their stupid courses,” she says during a dinnertime rant. “Can’t stand them.” The only person willing to tolerate Pansy is her sister, a warm and optimistic single mother of daughters, played by Michele Austin. While the film begins with a humorous tone, the laughter eventually fades, giving way to the quiet weight of its themes. —Jeanne Malle