The best moments in Patricia Highsmith’s novels are the ones in which we see quick flashes of her protagonists’ interiority, before they reset the masks they’re inevitably presenting to the rest of the world.
We learn in the documentary “Loving Highsmith” that the author herself knew plenty about the duality that defined so many of her characters. As director Eva Vitija makes clear, Highsmith was required — by law, by society, perhaps also by personality — to wear a number of masks throughout her life and career.
Though she certainly qualified as a public figure, Highsmith remained deeply private. And who could blame her? The years between 1950 and 1980, when she wrote most of her bestsellers, were hardly welcoming to most female professionals, let alone gay women who soundly rejected cultural norms of marriage, children and strictly-defined femininity.