Undescribable Perfection

Pretty Good

Blistering performances.

The acting is good, and the firecracker script has some excellent ideas.

A drunk, washed-up poet is hired to solve a family mystery.The main character is a highly literate pompous old fellow struggling with his own existence. A lot of the comedy comes from him insulting people using very long words, which I found very amusing.There is not a lot to this movie. Don't expect dramatic plot twists, edge of the seat action, moving performances or fire works of any kind. But this film achieves what it sets out to do perfectly!This film is gentle, interesting, funny and quite refreshing.This is definitely a Sunday afternoon watch, but for that time slot it is perfect! Production, acting, script are all exceptional!This film hasn't tried to reach too far and it pays off dividends.Watch this after your Sunday roast with a drink for a perfect afternoon.

This a strange one. Adapted from a Stephen Fry novel this film is a hard one to pigeon hole. It starts off as a comedy with some Malcolm Tucker ( The thick of it ) like scenes played brilliantly by Roger Allam it then turns into a stately home farce and ends up being like a detective mystery story. Its the story of a drunken poet and theatre critic who loses his job and then agrees to investigate goings on at Swafford Manor where so called miracles are being performed. I enjoyed the performances in this especially from Roger Allam but the film itself left me a little cold probably because I couldn't really relate to the people in it plus it was a little too high brow for my liking. As soon a poetry is mentioned , which it is several times , I tend to glaze over and lose interest. If you are into the old Agatha Christie movies I can see how this might appeal but it wasn't for me.

I cannot recommend this movie for many reasons. I will list three:The dialogue..."blah, blah, blah, cuss, cuss, cuss...blah, blah, blah, cuss, cuss, cuss."It's focus on destroying any hope or faith at all was disturbing. Disrespecting and ridiculing throughout.The theme of "how sexually disgusting can I be... all set in a beautiful English countryside" was a constant. And truthfully, it just got old...it's like the writer was stuck on the same merry-go-round of: disgust, rude, offense, sexual baseness, cuss....but with an Englishaccent to make it sound really brilliant. Well, don't be deceived, it was not.I wasted my time...don't waste yours.

A clapped out poet brings his powers of perception to an English country house acclaimed for its miraculous cures, and finds more than he bargained for ...Lovely doff of the cap to English detective fiction that declines to avert its gaze into the nonsense of the convention. The theme of miracle cures is important, so the one scene of emotion toward the end matters a lot - I didn't feel it, maybe because the moment of death was never addressed thematically. Hey - it's a country estate, built on the deaths of others.The pace and humour are good, and the hero is perfectly smashed and detached. The weakness is in the supporting characters - not the performances, but their drama and the necessity of their presence. No great turns or lines, and I guess that's down to the original writing.Music and sets are gorgeous, editing keeps it clipping along.Overall: Insightful and entertaining, not so dramatic.