Customer Reviews
a masterpiece - By: minty, 12 Sep 2008 
i think one of the frustrations of reading reviews of this film, is the focus on the sexual.
whereas, what i felt spoke the brilliance of the film was the familial relations. the undervalued emotionallly frustrated youngest daughter spoke volumes of the mother's failure to love, essentiallly.
so much better that i thought - By: Ms. F. I. Macdonald, 20 Jan 2008 
i was so surprised & happy with this film,i loved the idea of a old lady embarking on an affair with a young, handsome man who is also in love with the lady's daughter, the story was very moving & felt very eral, & the cast was chosen perfectly.
What a load of old toss!!! - By: Jerome O'Shea, 17 Sep 2007 
....and I'm not talking about the content of the film. I got this DVD as I thought it looked interesting & a bit different but it was dreadful. The plus points are: Anne Reid.........er, that's it. Everything else in this film was utter dross, Daniel Craig (is he the Hugh Grant of the noughties? this isn't a compliment) does his usual sensitive but smouldering bit which covers up the fact he is a sh*te actor. The characters & plot are laughably bad, when Dad dies on a visit to London, he is never mentioned again & his wife stays on in London - don't the middle classes bury their dead?. It's a film that thinks it's a lot more thought provoking than it is & a smugness hangs over the whole thing.
If you want a British film that tackles a diffcult subject well, with real characters try Gary Oldman's 'Nil By Mouth' not this cack.
A challenge to cultural misperceptions of age - By: Penelope, 16 Sep 2007 This one is for alll those with the misperception that women over a certain age simply enjoy a nice warm cup of cocoa before bed. Anne Reid's 'mother' strikes up an odd relationship with a handy man half her age & what ensues is a very strange movie about, ehem, a mother having sex! Surely a moral & cultural paradox! Of course my tongue is placed firmly in cheek & why the premise of this movie should be strange I do not know. I would hazard a guess that it has something to do with our culture that tends to deem anyone over the age of 25 past it & not deserving of love. So full credit goes to the makers of this film that challlenges our cultural perceptions of age, sexuality & gender. Of course the movie is not just about busting 'taboos', it explores mother/daughter relationships, grief, loneliness & how we perceive mothers in general. We should support British film making like this because there will certainly be no Hollywood equivalent taking on such brave subject matter.
A surprise gem - By: Rachel Clark, 18 Feb 2007 I came across this film by accident & reallly liked it. It's such an interesting story (how wonderful at last to see an older woman being portrayed as a sexual being & having sex with a younger guy!) The acting from the two leads was amazing & the scenes totallly believable. The film also said a lot about the fragmentation of modern families & how lonely a place the family unit can actuallly be. As previous reviewers have said, there are few characters to actuallly like in this film but whilst the two main leads play characters that are rounded & believable (if not always likeable), I found the characters of the children strangely unsatisfying & this is why I have given it four stars rather than five. The film makes it clear that May was not always an easy mother but I still found her children's hostility indifference to her slightly baffling - the two children came across as slightly two dimensional characters. However, the main focus of the film was on the relationship between Darren & May & I thought this was portrayed brilliantly. Overalll, a highly recommended film.
