Easy Virtue (2008)
Average Rating: 5.8/10
Reviews Counted: 122
Fresh: 63 | Rotten: 59
A lightweight and pithy Noel Coward adaptation with plenty of sparkle and fizz.
Average Rating: 5.7/10
Critic Reviews: 33
Fresh: 15 | Rotten: 18
A lightweight and pithy Noel Coward adaptation with plenty of sparkle and fizz.
liked it
Average Rating: 3.1/5
User Ratings: 28,983
Movie Info
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. ~
May 22, 2009 Wide
Sep 15, 2009
$2.5M
Sony Pictures Classics
Watch It Now
Cast
-
Jessica Biel
Larita Huntington -
Ben Barnes
John Whittaker -
Colin Firth
Colonel Jim Whittaker -
Kristin Scott Thomas
Veronica Whittaker -
Kimberley Nixon
Hilda Whittaker -
Kris Marshall
Furber -
Katherine Parkinson
Marion Whittaker -
Pip Torrens
Lord Hurst -
Christian Brassington
Philip Hurst -
Charlotte Riley
Sarah Hurst -
Jim McManus
Jackson -
Jeremy Hooton
Davis -
Joanna Bacon
Cook -
Maggie Hickey
Millie the Maid
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Easy Virtue Trailer & Photos
All Critics (123) | Top Critics (33) | Fresh (63) | Rotten (59) | DVD (5)
Echoing the words of the great Porter song, Easy Virtue deliciously misbehaves.
Top CriticThese are good actors telling a good story, so the virtue is indeed easy to grasp, and a fine time should be had by all.
Easy Virtue has all the elements for a sprightly romp with serious underpinnings, and occasionally it achieves that balance. But it's marred by attempts at farce that are as belabored as they are ill-advised.
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.
Jessica Biel gets more publicity for her body and her boyfriend than for her acting ability, but Easy Virtue may be cause for a reassessment.
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.
A period piece that may play well with those who hate period pieces. [Blu-ray]
Easy Virtue makes subtle comedy look easy. The ensemble is brilliant, and Noel Coward's play-brought-to-film is just good enough . . . .
This British drawing-room comedy feels awfully familiar but is redeemed by some tart performances.
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.
It's only a surprise if you haven't seen his other films.
Awkwardly conceived in a superficial reality that leaves its punch lines without much punch.
Biel's performance lacks the zing needed to jolt this comedy of manners.
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."
If Colin Firth and Kristin Scott Thomas firing snarky bon mots at people for 90 minutes doesn't sound entertaining, I don't know what to tell you.
...almost undone by the casting of thoroughly modern Jessica Biel.
Easy to like but hard to wholly recommend.
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.
Said husband, as well as the family's other members, are as bland and forgettable as the 1920s British cuisine on display.
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.
Will appeal only to Anglophiles who swoon at the sound of such words as 'codswallop'...
Sporadically engaging, Easy Virtue would do better swapping amusement for a more elusive quarry: truth.
To say that her casting doesn't work is an understatement. And there's not nearly enough of Coward's biting wit on display here.
Stephan Elliott is back with a vengeance. He's also back with a movie that's not only a worthy successor to Priscilla, it may be even better.
Audience Reviews for Easy Virtue
Super Reviewer
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.
Super Reviewer
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- John Whittaker: Mother,this is my wife,Larita.
- Larita Huntington: Mrs Whittaker, the pleasure is all mine!
- Veronica Whittaker: Oh,you're American...
- Colonel Jim Whittaker: And very welcome!
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- Larita Huntington: You have no idea what it means to love someone so much that you will do anything for them. Even inject them with poison when they were too feeble to do it for themselves.
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Movie: ID: 770790607 Title: Easy Virtue Release Date: 2009-05-22 00:00:00.0 MPAA: 3 Status: 1
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Foreign Titles
- Easy Virtue - Eine unmoralische Ehefrau (DE)
- Un mariage de rêve (FR)
