Cast Gemma Arterton, Dominic Cooper, Tamsin Greig, Luke Evans
Director Stephen Frears
Rating TBA
When Tamara Drewe (Arterton) returns to her former home in the super-quaint village of Ewedown in the English countryside, bored schoolgirls, best-selling authors, a hot ex and some visiting would-be writers are soon all in thrall to the denim shorts-wearing beauty who's desperately trying to offload the rambling cottage of her childhood.
And thanks to a pretty darn good nose job (and the flashbacks of a mega-honked Tamara are scarily realistic), a nice line in put-the-men-in-their-place putdowns and a fab job as a columnist for a London newspaper, Ms Drewe soon has her neighbours' curtains twitching with her goings on.
Over in the next manor, playboy writer Nicholas Hardiment (Roger Allam) keeps wife Beth's (Greig) nerves at breaking point with his extra-marital activities, all of which provide material for the visiting would-be authors who trek to the couple's retreat to blitz their block and find their muse.
After a visit to a music festival, Tamara ends up with rock drummer fiancé, Ben (Cooper), who's the unwitting obsession of village schoolgirls Jody and Casey (played by Jessica Barden and relative newcomer Charlotte Christie), who take it upon themselves to break into Tamara's home and hack into her email with the sort of disastrous consequences the young aren't equipped to stop and think about.
With neighbours spying on each other via binoculars across their green fields, clandestine meetings in shaded woodland copses and love-fuelled mercy dashes through sleepy English villages, one of the real stars of the movie is of course the beautiful English countryside - only to be expected really, directed as it is by The Queen director Stephen Frears.
And with royal wedding fever upon us, do yourself a favour and feast your eyes on this lovely, jolly, feel-good Brit flick.
