‘Secrets & Lies’

Mike Leigh’s accalaimed 1996 film is a piercingly honest, completely accessible piece of work that goes directly to the heart. At the center of “Secrets & Lies” is Cynthia (Brenda Blethyn), one of those needy, sentimental, good-hearted people whose desperation puts off those they depend on for support and love. Then there is Hortense (Marianne Jean-Baptiste, left, with Claire Rushbrook), a tranquil, sophisticated, single black woman who works as an optometrist and seems to have no possible connection to the emotionally impoverished world of Cynthia (Cinemax Friday at 8 p.m.).