Um Dia Perfeito Para Casar

A subtle tale of families and romance and reality, beautifully shot, with an underlying humour and sadness. The interplay of characters was brilliant. Loved it.

Just before I sat down to watch this movie I had painted a floor. Watching that dry would have been more interesting. I continued to watch as an exercise in masochism.

Maybe because I find the lead actress very unpleasant. She drank way to much and pretty much continuously. Never did really get who all the other people were, yes, a sister and a mother. Was the vicar the father? An annoying missionary guest. Assorted friends? Relatives?

My two stars go to the person(s) responsible for the selection of the house, the costumer, the overall period look which is achieved very nicely, including hairdos.

The viewer certainly understands the main points of the story. They don't have to be re-told over and over again, in flashbacks and from different characters. If these were real people I would not wish any of them well.

I suppose, it is one of film for who the borders between I loike it- it is boring- it has not subject-I love it are more than fragil.

But it is a honest and beautiful film, remembering the universe proposed by James ivory and giving a large slice of very salted cake.

Beautiful acting, inspired cinematography, well crafted dialogues and a blind venerable servant near a special turtle, a summer romance of past and the wedding of present , fragility, joy and connected lives and absolutely fair end.

For me, was a more than pleasant surprise and its English bitterness is served in the most admirable manner , like a cup of black tea.

So, a beautiful, in profound sense, for so many motives, film. First, for the lovely honest perspective about love, duty and choices.

A carefully crafted film which is at once a celebration of English eccentricity and an understated examination of how families often do everything they can to avoid saying how they really feel. Felicity Jones and Luke Treadaway play the lead protagonists brilliantly, but the scene stealer throughout is the wonderful Ellie Kendrick as the younger sister Kitty. Her naivety often reveals so much about what everyone else is really thinking but just can't bring themselves to say. And perhaps the symbolism will be lost on some, but without giving anything away tortoises and a small boy's little bombs mark the path of this film with great effect.

Ah, the British! They have their eccentricities that have been providing fodder for little films for years - from the great stories of EM Forster, Evelyn Waugh, Julian Fellowes et al to the little dramadies such as this one written by director Donald Rice with Mary Henely-Magill, CHEERFUL WEATHER FOR THE WEDDING. They come off best when the odd class-oriented families take themselves seriously, covering their narrow view of the world of civility with accents so thick and rapidly delivered that without subtitles it is difficult to follow the script! But they are enchanting, especially when delivered by a cast of superb actors who are able to enter these odd characters' psyches and make us titter while we endure their snobbishness.

This film is meticulously presented and is both a celebration of English eccentricity and an understated examination of how families often do everything they can to avoid saying how they really feel. Dolly Thatcham (Felicity Jones) is to be married to the wealthy Owen (James Norton) after a very brief engagement: Dolly delays her preparations for the ceremony by drinking rum upstairs as she has flashbacks to her real romance a summer ago with the young professor Joseph Patten (Luke Treadaway) whom Dolly has invited to the wedding (to her mother's (Elizabeth McGovern) chagrin and Joseph waits downstairs with the entire bizarre family and friends awaiting Dolly's descent to proceed to the church. The story is interrupted with all manner of subplots including the strange behavior of Dolly's younger sister Kitty (Ellie Kendrick) who provides the audience with a naïveté that reveals so much about what everyone else is really thinking but just can't bring themselves to say.

Among the entertaining eccentrics having luncheon before the wedding are the bickering married couple (Fenella Woolgar and Mackenzie Crook) attempting to stop their son young Jimmy (Ben Greaves-Neil) from setting off little bombs throughout the house, aging but silly Aunt Bella (Barbara Flynn) seducing her chauffeur (Emil Lager), the perennial old maid Miss Spoon (Joanna Hole), the day's drunk Tom (Olly Alexander) and of course the only people about whom we care - the servants (Eva Traynor, Paola Dionisotti, Sophie Stanton, Kenneth Collard. The use of flashbacks to give us insight into Dolly's dilemma of marrying for convenience instead of for love is beautifully handled by creating a golden glow touch to the sequences from the past by cinematographer John Lee and a lovely musical score by Michael Price. And in a final farewell speech Joseph manages to put everything in its rightful place. It all works well, but put on the subtitles or you'll be in the dark.

Grady Harp