Cast overview, first billed only: | |||
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Kathryn Worth | ... | Anna |
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Harry Kershaw | ... | Archie |
Emma Hiddleston | ... | Badge | |
Henry Lloyd-Hughes | ... | Jack | |
Tom Hiddleston | ... | Oakley | |
Mary Roscoe | ... | Verena | |
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Michael Hadley | ... | Charlie |
David Rintoul | ... | George | |
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Leonetta Mazzini | ... | Leonetta Mazzini |
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Giovanna Mennell | ... | Giovanna Mennell |
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Jonathan Mennell | ... | Jonathan Mennell |
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Elisabetta Fiorentini | ... | Elisabetta Fiorentini |
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Giuseppe Fiorentini | ... | Giuseppe Fiorentini |
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Beatrice Ferné Fiorentini | ... | Beatrice Ferné Fiorentini |
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Andrea Fiorentini | ... | Andrea Fiorentini |
During a sticky patch in her marriage forty-something Anna spends a summer holiday with her friends Verena and George at their Tuscan villa but hangs out with the couple's teen-aged children and their cousin Oakley, with whom she goes skinny-dipping and sight-seeing. When the youngsters prang a borrowed car and Anna tells George how it happened, causing a huge scene with his elder son, the kids turn against her. Observing family life as an outsider - unrelated - Anna ultimately comes to be grateful for what she has got. Written by don @ minifie-1
If you wanted a villa holiday in Tuscany this summer and didn't have time, go to this film and by the end you will feel you have spent a fortnight there. Joanna Hogg has created an upper-middle class version of a Mike Leigh film at his slowest. It's beautifully done, and the fortnight is mostly enjoyable, unless you squirm at the sight of drunken Brits abroad or the sound of the upper-middle classes (I developed a thick skin for both of these a long time ago, myself).
The characterisation is subtle, verging on invisible. There's very little intellectual content or sparkling conversation, surely unrealistic in a film about the chattering classes? Perhaps it's the prodigious amount of alcohol that's consumed. All this keeps the focus on Anna, on holiday from her unhappy situation at home, and the cheerfully pie-eyed teenagers that she hangs out with.
The movie was very thin on plot, yet there did seem to be inconsistencies on the departure date for some of the party. I doubt I'll watch it again to check this though; once is nice, but enough.