TIFF 2025 | Movie Review: John Early Shines In Feature Debut with "Maddie's Secret"
11/12 ForReel Score | 4.5/5 Stars
He may blush and shake his head when called a genius, but it’s truly the only word to describe John Early. Actor, comedian, now writer/director and star of TIFF’s opening Discovery film. Maddie’s Secret is a love letter to the beautifully crafted Greek tragedies of a bygone era, the late 80s tv movie. The glossy visuals, the vapid cadence of it’s characters, and the high camp comedy all come together to create a film that is so unapologetically itself. It teleports the viewer back to a time in front of the tv set, surfing channels until stumbling upon an outlandish afterschool special. Eyes glued to the screen in disbelief at the over the top madness taking place on screen.
Early is most notably known for playing foul abrasive characters, which makes his transformation into the bright eyed and bushy tailed ingénue that much more astonishing. Maddie is the perfect girl. She doesn’t curse nor watch tv, her skin glistens after a long run, and has smoking hot grizzly bear husband, Jake (Eric Rahill), who loves to going down on her. When one of her vegetarian cooking videos go viral overnight it leads to her getting a promotion at her Bon Appétit-esq job. She rises up the ranks from dishwasher to her dream role, recipe developer. Maddie has everything she asked for, so why does she feel a pit in her stomach? The stress of making delicious meals while also looking good on camera sends her back into a binge/purge cycle she thought she’d left behind.
The effects of her bulimia begin to overtake her every waking thought. Maddie spends every waking minute thinking about food, reading comments, and building an air of lies around her. Creating a rift between Maddie and best friend Deena (Kate Berlant), pushing her further into competition with the other viperous head chef Emily (Claudia O’Doherty), and hiding from the man who loves her unconditionally. It’s hard to discuss the further details of her disorder without watching the film. It’s by no means a parody or intent on making fun of Maddie. Early takes this opportunity to lay bare the known but hardly discussed real issues many food influencers face on the daily.
It’s nearly impossible to be consistently crafting these high caloric meals, eating them on camera, and remaining rail thin. Early knows this and trust his audience to be intelligent enough to grasp the social dynamics. To understand when things are being played up for laughs v. when to give the characters a moment of grace. There’s so much empathy for Maddie. Early’s able to so tenderly capture the dimensions of a woman who is talented, kind, bashful, but also riddled with anxiety and self doubt.
The film was not made with mainstream appeal in mind. Early knows his audience and plays hard for them. Imagine if John Waters wrote a Lifetime time movie back in the 80s, but the script wasn’t developed until the post-covid era. That’s the world Maddie’s Secret inhabits. Cinematographer Max Lakner is able to capture the high camp glossy style of films like Perfect Body (1997) and Kate’s Secret (1986) with tender remembrance. Maddie is never shown in a degrading light, neither seen nor heard in the act of vomiting. A shadow of her hair going into a bun before closing the bathroom door is enough to know what Maddie is doing without possibly triggering a viewer who knows Maddie’s struggle all to well.
Maddie’s Secret is an 80s after school special injected with the fiercest level of camp that hasn’t graced the big screen since Showgirls in 1995. In a time where inherently queer filmmaking is seemingly becoming too taboo for studios it’s such a breath of fresh air to see a filmmaker so unabashedly themself. Knowing the film was plagued by a restricted budget and a bite sized amount of time is a testament to the strength of Early’s eye as a filmmaker. If he’s able to craft such a dynamic and playful story with these constraints image the possibilities when his resources are boundless. John Early is the Orson Wells of gay comedian millennials.
Acting and Casting - 2 | Visual Effects and Editing - 2 | Story and Message - 2| Entertainment Value - 2 | Music Score and Soundtrack - 1 | Reviewer's Preference -2 | What does this mean?