Kattiera Nana I think this is a new genre that they're all sort of working their way through it and haven't got all the kinks worked out yet but it's a genre that works for me.

ChicRawIdol A brilliant film that helped define a genre

Fairaher The film makes a home in your brain and the only cure is to see it again.

Juana what a terribly boring film. I'm sorry but this is absolutely not deserving of best picture and will be forgotten quickly. Entertaining and engaging cinema? No. Nothing performances with flat faces and mistaking silence for subtlety.

i-burgess1 Now I must admit I've not read the book, but I cannot believe that it can be this bad. The dialogue is awful. At the beginning of the film the lead (totally out of her depth) speaks like a 21st century adolescent. What child in Victorian times would have spoken to her mother like she did, stomped off, slammed her bedroom door and not come down to dinner? I was amazed that she didn't switch on her I-Pod. A totally unsympathetic character - gauche is probably a compliment. And the literature she was supposed to be producing? Gothic rubbish (see Jane Austen's Northanger Abbey for a put down of this tripe)? The outcome of the relationship with her husband was totally predictable - oh, how ironic at the end! What a waste of Sam Neill and one of my favourite actresses, Charlotte Rampling. Tyntesfield looked good though - mind you, in these days of 'global warming' we don't get snow in Wraxall anymore.

karmabuona My advice would be don't waste your time with this film.Large chunks were clearly meant to be ironic but much was also meant to be more darkly realistic. The result was a wildly veering mish-mash of genres which the director failed to navigate successfully.Overall, the film felt like a mix between a 1940s melodrama and a 1970s made-for-TV two-part series, with a loathsome central character.Two people in our group of 20 loved the film, so it must have something going for it. The rest of us were desperate for it to be over from about 20 minutes in. At one point, the main character gets sick, and from behind me and beside me I heard simultaneous mutters of "please die" and "thank god". That was exactly how I felt.I am sure the film was making all kinds of comments about art, literature, characterization etc etc but it all went sailing over my head. Driving home, I said as much to my flatmate, and he paraphrased Bill Hicks to me: "The film was bad. Don't get suckered into believing it actually saying something complex and clever. It was bad. Leave it at that and walk away".

Balthazar-5 I must be a masochist. Ozon's work is tiresome, at best, yet, since he is clearly technically able, I keep saying 'maybe this time...' But no. This time is worse than all of the rest. This time is embarrassing kitsch. Poor Romola Garai - a wonderful actress. Here she is persuaded to over-act with such crass stupidity that she is almost unrecognisable from her stunning performance in 'Atonement'. OTT has its place in cinema, but it is a place that needs a context. Here there is no context, just tastelessness piled upon tastelessness.The characters do not engage. The relationships do not engage. The style is flowery enough to make the Chelsea Flower Show look drab - but to what effect? None. Style is nothing if it is not pointed in the direction or theme. (And theme is nothing if it is not arrived at through style.) The script of this may have looked fine, but once on the floor, Ozon killed it stone dead. By the end, I would not have been surprised if the director had entered screen left tap dancing and singing 'I'm gay, I'm gay, I'm gay.' (Lest it be thought I am homophobic - Pedro Almodovar is Europe's greatest director by a long way, in my estimation.) The sad thing is that, while other much much greater directors are unable to find the funds necessary to make great films, some idiots are willing to pour millions into this rubbish.Save one... there is one moment in the film which is beautiful - but it is borrowed from someone else. The moment when Angel encounters her husband's child is truly affecting - but it is too close for comfort to the moment in 'Once Upon A Time in America' when Noodles encounters Max' son.This film is absolute drivel.

Derek Bullen This movie is rubbish. The only good aspect was that my wife won our tickets, so we didn't have to part with good money to see it.Nothing worked for me. The characterisations were poor. Sam Neill (as always) played Sam Neill and even Charlotte Rampling (for whom I have great admiration) couldn't save the film. I can only compare it to Titanic - not the movie but the ship.Who was Angelica? I know she had something to do with Paradise (which was shown in reverse over the gate of the house right at the beginning, but the right way around for the rest of the movie), but, as a character, she wasn't introduced. Was this edited out, or was I in a coma at the time and missed it? What went wrong with the background shots? Alfred Hitchcock did a better job of them in the 60s. How can it be that, with all the modern technology, it was so obvious and poor? I quite simply did not believe any of it. One man after the movie came up to my wife and myself with a bemused smile on his face and asked, "What was that all about?" He said he was expecting Angel to wake up and find it all a dream. My comment in reply, "Mas more like a nightmare" The only thing I found even remotely interesting was the way Esme used the wheelchair Angel gave him to hang himself from. This gives some idea as to how boring I found the rest! I suffered the movie expecting my wife to say that she found it moving (i.e. I thought it had to be a "chick flick" that only women can enjoy). Meanwhile, Barbara sat through it thinking that I must have found something "arty" about it. If we had only known, we could have walked out and not had to endure the torture.I could not, in all consciousness, recommend this movie - even to a person I hate.None of it worked; none of it inspired; none of it entertained. It was even too horrible to be amusing.