Emily Mortimer stars as Florence, a widow who dreams of opening a book shop in the village she grew up in. She finds a run down building and orders in some stock. So far so good, and she even nets a regular customer in the reclusive Bill Nighy, who is also on his own and in the need of some action. Book action.
But there are clouds on the horizon. Light fluffy clouds, but clouds no less. Evil Patricia Clarkson wants Florence’s building for her Art Centre and her dirty tricks to get it no know bounds. Well she opens a rival book shop and poaches Florence’s schoolgirl helper.
Will the bookshop prevail? Will the friendship will Bill go anywhere and does she have adequate fire insurance?
Clearly I’m not the target audience for this film, but it really was meandering pap. I get that it was gently paced with loneliness a big theme but I was just waiting for something to happen - anything.
At one point Florence invests in 250 copies of ‘Lolita’ but that didn’t go anywhere. We never saw the rival bookshop and James Lance’s miscast London arty type villain offered little and delivered less.
The film looked good and evoked a gentler time in 1950s East Anglia. The perils were minor and everyone was quite nice although they were all bastards underneath. I could have done without Julie Christie’s pretentious voice over and it was no surprise to learn which character she was - clue the only young female in the cast.
I don’t think we learned anything here and there were certainly no laughs or thrills. You could dress it up as a ’slice of life’, but it would be a dull and unconvincing life.
The cast was mostly decent with Bill Nighy doing his usual thing in a suit and Patricia Clarkson trying to channel Cruella DeVille. Mortimer does OK in the lead and is likeable but you never got the sense she was truly invested in the shop, and the ending kind of underscored that.
Over all this was an inoffensive bit of period drama but an instantly forgettable one - read a good book instead!
THE Tag Line : Don’t Book a Viewing - 54%
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