Dead Gorgeous

I saw this on Talking Pictures and recorded it.

The surprise was that I had seen it when originally aired but I had forgotten what it was called and who was in it and I had wanted to see it again, but couldn't find it.

So much better than contemporary drama with all its political correctness, inclusion, diversity et al.

Both Helen McCrory and Fay Ripley are excellent in the lead roles. Different personalities, one dominating the other although this does not really manifest itself until near the end.

The ending was a little clumsy there were a few things that could have been tidier, like taking the car back to where it normally was rather than dumping it.

Definitely worth watching.

Some have compared this film to,"Strangers On a Train", but I do not believe it should be compared at all. It is a wonderful comedy/mystery and does not have the tenseness of a pure mystery as it is a tongue in cheek comedy. The sets - clothes - hair styles, etc. are perfect to the period of 1946 London wherein two school chums meet in a queue of a Bond street store. They then set in motion the plot of ridding themselves of husbands they don't want, one probably should go,the other Hector, is standing in the way of Antonia who wants a younger college prof. I do not want to give away all of the plot - but I will say this is a very fine film that I am sending to friends - the highest compliment.

I disagree with Flickman's review. I found it very intriguing and pretty tightly-woven. While there were slow moments, I thought most of the film moved at a pretty good clip and I was quite pleased with it. I found it far better than passable.

I just watched this on YouTube (free) and was surprised how much I enjoyed it. I'm always looking for "vintage British films" but I think I found this via "British mysteries" or similar. I almost didn't watch it as it's a TV film I never heard of, but was attracted to the "bump off each other's husband" scenario and gave it a go.

The sets, costumes and general ambiance were right up my street as I'm a big fan of wartime Britain (and into the rest of the 1940s). Fay and Helen were both terrific in their roles, although Helen's character went a bit OTT near the end, and I feared it was going to be a "woman suddenly goes completely insane and admits to heinous crimes" a la many other TV cop shows, but this surprised me by NOT copping out in that way.

I enjoyed this right to the end and found it surprisingly entertaining.

While this made-for-TV movie is based on a novel by Peter Lovesey, it covers the same territory as Alfred Hitchcock's classic thriller, "Strangers on A Train." The acting, sets and costumes are pretty decent, but the story movies slowly and there's little real tension. Not a bad effort, but hardly a "must see."