Synopsis
On a warm spring day in 1924, house maid and foundling Jane Fairchild finds herself alone on Mother's Day. Her employers, Mr. and Mrs. Niven, are out and she has the rare chance to spend quality time with her secret lover. Paul is the boy from the manor house nearby, Jane's long-term love despite the fact that he's engaged to be married to another woman, a childhood friend and daughter of his parents' friends. But events that neither can foresee will change the course of Jane's life forever.
Your Movie Library
Cast
- Odessa YoungJane Fairchild
- Josh O'ConnorPaul Sheringham
- Sope DirisuDonald
- Patsy FerranMilly
- Emma D'ArcyEmma Hobday
- Glenda JacksonJane (Older)
- Olivia ColmanMrs Clarrie Niven
- Colin FirthMr Godfrey Niven
- Nathan ReeveDick
- Samuel BarlowYoung Paul
Recommendations
- 90
Screen Daily
It’s a richly detailed mosaic of a movie which pays as much attention to emotional authenticity – a dull ache of grief which is the aftermath of the First World War and a smouldering yearning between the two lovers – as it does to the story itself. - 83
The Playlist
A thoughtful if occasionally melodramatic reflection on the nature of grief. - 80
The Telegraph
There’s so much distinction here, and maybe just a slight vagueness about theme as Husson nears the finish line: it’s a tough ask to end a film well which is so given over to memory, and this becomes a bit of a waft in the general direction of closure. - 70
Variety
Telling a story that advocates living boldly over not living at all, Husson has followed suit, opening up exciting new possibilities for her career in the process. - 60
Los Angeles Times
It never quite comes together — the decades-spanning connective tissue somehow feels both overstated and thin — but Husson’s skill with actors, among them Colin Firth, Olivia Colman, Ṣọpẹ Dìrísù and the great Glenda Jackson, yields undeniable dividends. - 60
The Guardian
It is a lovely-looking, lovely-sounding movie, handsomely designed, meticulously shot and impeccably performed — and it also has interesting things to say about the emotional toughness and the Greeneian splinter of ice in the heart, that is needed by a writer. But I have to admit that, despite my liking for slow cinema, I found something a bit indulgent and classy about the unvarying andante pace. - 60
The Hollywood Reporter
Even the lush world-building of the visuals here, committed performances especially from Young, and stream-of-consciousness editing aren’t enough to conjure the wry, melancholy, and, above all, intensely literary interior voice of the book’s protagonist.
