KnotMissPriceless Why so much hype?

MamaGravity good back-story, and good acting

Onlinewsma Absolutely Brilliant!

Odelecol Pretty good movie overall. First half was nothing special but it got better as it went along.

herbqedi This is a very British movie. To the gentry, the inconvenient hit-and- run death of a commoner is too messy to allow it to tarnish their lives even if that commoner happens to be the spouse of their servant (wonderfully played by Linda Bassett). In point of fact, all the acting is excellent and takes us in-depth into the shallowness and fecklessness of its three leads. Emily Watson is one of my favorite actresses and her eyes and smile send my heart a- flutter. She is fascinating plumbing the depths of the soul of well- meaning wife who kills her beloved servant's husband without taking legal responsibility and cuckolds and deserts her husband. She earnestly regrets all but does nothing about it - even to the point of forcing the cuckolded husband to lie in support of her lover's lie. Rupert Everett is so perfectly cast as the feckless and ne'er-do-well- but-charming son of A Lord (wonderfully played by John Neville)that it almost seems as though the part were written for him. Tom Wilkenson plays the influential barrister who allows himself to be disrespected and depressed but never quite disgraced enough by the private humiliation to show his embarrassment in public. To say that this is a balancing act for an actor of titanic proportions is an understatement. But, after all, this is Tom Wilkinson, one of the greatest living actors on the planet and he pulls it off with grace and aplomb. So, why just 4/10 for this drawing room drama? it buckles under the weight of its own clichés and the script fails to compensate with any type of droll wit, just bitter irony -and not enough of that. For a glimpse of how this should be done, see the marvelous 1950 adaptation of J. B. Priestly's An Inspector Calls starring Alistair Sim or the film adaptation Terrence Rattigan's Separate Tables. Both interject their characters with enough self-effacing and ironic droll wit that the tawdry situations seem fresh and new. Here they are simply tawdry clichés. This is especially true of Wilkinson's obligatory affair with office-mate Hermoine Norris who welcomes the boss into her bed and still supports him after he unceremoniously dumps her. The obligatory rants against the gentry's disregard for the working class by the Police Detective (the always-excellent David Harewood) to the servant just adds to the viewer's shrugs of "Again?" I'd pay good money on the West End to see Wilkinson, Watson, Everett, Harewood, and Bassett read the phone book. The trouble is that I think they would be able to improvise more interest, originality, and droll lines from the phone book than from this script. Ultimately, I found this a disappointing deployment of a half dozen amazing performances.In summary, if you wish to see Separate Lies as a canvas for excellent British acting to study and hone your own techniques, it is well worth renting. If you watch this as entertainment, you will find yourself looking at your watch and ultimately be disappointed.

pc95 Early on during Separate Lies, you know there's something out of sorts. The narrator, James, as the lead character has hinted at it through his hindsight, and you expect some tumult. However, the perplexing decision the director has made is to only focus on the main character wholly. We feel his shock, bewilderment,confusion, and sadness. But we're only really able to witness and empathize with him rather than the other two main characters. This decision of only focusing on him seems to weaken the emotional impact in terms of the screenplay although it may be more original. (spoilers) At first reaction to the waves of bad news, I felt some pretty strong contempt for the Wilkerson's character in his supposed emotions and reactions, as sort of lacking a backbone and becoming a doormat. But upon pondering, I thought the whole thing seemed somewhat believable just not agreeable. Anyway, the movie's screenplay is pretty good - but without the emotional angles of Anne and William (other 2 main characters) it becomes a one-sided story which may be the point. Separate Lies is well acted, scripted but detached and aloof save for Wilkerson making it strangely unappealing and lacking. (spoiler) The lead character's initial reaction to infidelity is too forgiving, although his about face in terms of the accident was well played out. And the Watson character at times does not seem convincing in her lack of emotion. How are we able to believe her feelings if all that is on display is her blank countenances during conversations? Also, how unaffected and blasé the 2 perpetrators of the accident are was distastefully repugnant. Several characters keep remarking how Anne (Watson character) is riddled with guilt, but it hardly registered in any scene. Wilkerson seems to perform best in no small part to his majority share of screen-time and his validation of emotions. Pretty good, but could've been better, and maybe even done without the accident.

waltcosmos I gave it a seven only because the acting is good. And of course by that I mean Wilkinson. The other two principals were "decent". But the characters themselves...what on earth was so bad about the character Wilkinson played (James Manning)? I didn't see him behaving like the martinet Emily Watson accused him of being. Bill Bule, on the other hand, was an insufferable jerk who I was praying would meet an extremely brutal and prolonged demise. Who was I kidding? Tom Wilkinson isn't Paul Bettany after all. So what on EARTH did Emily Watson's (Anne) character SEE in him???? She herself admitted he was pretty much a piece of offal in his treatment of her. Why would she even want to be in the same TOWN as him, to say nothing of the same "room".I noticed some other reviews, one person said she "cried" at the end, to witness James' tragedy. ??? WHAT tragedy? What, you mean losing an imbecile who finds someone like Bill Bule AMUSING???!!! Give us a break.

Philby-3 Although this film is set amongst the sophisticated English upper classes it is a simple story of a couple torn asunder. It has a slightly dated air, being an adaptation of "A Way Through the Wood", a 1950 novel by Nigel Balchin (once hugely popular and now forgotten). Julian Fellowes, who despite an academy award for the script of "Gosford Park", has a somewhat anachronistic persona himself, wrote the script and directed (the latter for the first time). With the DVD version I saw there is a most illuminating audio commentary by Julian. His primary focus was on getting his characters right, and by and large he has succeeded. In this he was helped by two outstanding performances from Tom Wilkinson as James, the stitched up City lawyer, and Emily Watson as his attractive wife Anne. He also kept it short; the running time is only 80 minutes.James and Anne have a town house in Chelsea and a comfortable former vicarage in Buckinghamshire. Anne is some years younger but they are childless. Outwardly they seem happy, but James, one of nature's moralists (unusual for a city lawyer), is a control freak. Just down the road is the aristocratic the Hon. William Buel, who is not one for middle-class morality, and he is more than happy to take advantage. But there's a complication, a road accident, in which an elderly cyclist is knocked over in a country lane by a ruthlessly driven Range Rover just like the Hon. Bill's. Soon James, Anne, Bill and the victim's widow (who happens to be James' and Anne's cleaner) are drawn in to a conspiracy to conceal what really happened. The primary focus is on the corrosive effect of all this on James and Anne's relationship.The third person in this ménage a trios, Bill, is played by Rupert Everett. From the point of view of casting, his languid, superior manner is right for the part, yet somehow he doesn't quite get there. Partly this is because he is supposed to be sick for some of the time and he looks well when he is supposed to be sick, and vice-versa. The part seems underdeveloped. It is interesting that John Neville as Bill's father who has only one significant scene manages to establish his character beautifully in the time he has.The world of five star hotels and superior restaurants is nicely evoked. As Julian Fellowes says in the audio commentary, these people are able to convince themselves that the Edwardian age still exists. At bottom though, the film is about what draws a couple together and what tears them apart. Nigel Balchin was going through a marriage break-up when he wrote the book, and Fellowes has made a good fist of conveying the atmosphere. As he says, his is a fairly free adaptation, but the central theme is the same.