A glamorous American woman enters into a spirited battle of wits with her disapproving English mother-in-law in this period romantic comedy. John Whittaker (Ben Barnes) and Larita Huntington (Jessica Biel) married in haste following a whirlwind romance. But reality comes knocking when the couple arrives to visit John's parents and his mother has an allergic reaction to her new daughter-in-law. As the battle of wits between the two women escalates, John and Larita's marriage begins to suffer. ~
Jason Buchanan, Rovi
A winning, witty fox trot through the Roaring 20s, when men were men, women were liberating themselves and the 'to the manner born' were losing their grip on their manners -- and manors.
What might've been a scrumptious, chocolatey dessert of a movie -- a Noel Coward delite -- is instead a scoop of lemon ice, not filling, faintly sweet and mostly water.
Full of forced jocularity and drawing-room hissy fits, with its cast parading around in vintage threads and antique cars, Easy Virtue is a close-to-insufferable souffle based on the 1925 Noel Coward play.
The only characters who seem anchored in some form of reality are the hero's parents...all the others, from siblings to servants, are standard-issue eccentrics or the subjects of running gags.
Jessica Biel (7th Heaven) has a grand time playing a "wicked" American woman whom an upper-crust Brit (Ben Barnes) takes home to Meet the Parents in 1920s rural England.
A recent headline declared that [Jessica] Biel "is still trying to prove she's more than a pretty face." After Easy Virtue, she's still got something to prove.
Jessica Biel turns out to be up to the task of handling Coward's deliciously acidic lines and is well-matched with an impressive all-British cast in the sparkling "Easy Virtue."
Biel holds her own with the seamless acting chops of Firth and Thomas. The movie benefits from a snappy musical score with familiar standout show tunes from Cole Porter.
In 1988, Sheridan Morley noted that Easy Virtue "remains of interest chiefly as Noel's elegant, laconic tribute to a lost world of drawing-room dramas." This gleefully inelegant movie tosses even that mild interest away.
Biel is not completely miscast in this role of the Other in the drawing-room midst, but she exudes a thoroughly contemporary air that never jibes with the Twenties tenor of the English manor-born in the decade after the Great War.
A very enjoyable story about trying to move through life with all of the baggage that we inherit from our family and accumulate on our own.
Witty, clever and at times touching.
Made all the more powerful by the writing of Noel Coward and this amazing group of actors. Though the weakest link is Biel...she does a
pretty good job at holding her own against this pretty amazing cast.
Kristin Scott Thomas and Colin Firth are favorites of mine and are great here.
And it was my first time seeing Katherine Parkinson outside of her performance on the BBC series The IT Crowd and she was great as well.
Even the soundtrack was very clever with a 1920-30 style badn performing hits from the period intermixed with random hits from other (later) eras, done in 1920's style.
June 10, 2009
Robert C
Super Reviewer
...I think my dislike for this movie was clearly on the basis of miscasting...Jessica Beil does not ring as the perfect 20s flapper that this role called for. She just doesnt have the chops or the experience. It just didnt fit her at ALL. Collin Ferral and the rest of the cast were perfect but I just did NOT LIKE Beil
in this role...They should have gotten someone different.
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