The title sounds too much like a low brow rom com, but with these lead actors I had hope for depth and intelligence, particularly after their successful pairing in the excellent Stranger Than Fiction. But an average romantic comedy is just what this is, not the drama on Internet Movie Database. The actors/performances are better than the material.

The dialogue is naturalistic but I felt that is often down to the actors rather than the lines themselves. The transatlantic relationship feels like a marketing ploy rather than genuine character study, though I did like the attempt to squelch the British stiff upper lip stereotype.

I cringed at the beginning - the over talkative Harvey Shine (Hoffman) who pushes himself first into his fellow plane traveller and then onto Kate Walker (Thompson). The alienated Dad, the failed jazz pianist and now sacked jingle writer, the single woman who has employees and mother on to finding her a man… and then the family wedding… it all felt too familiar, too expected.

The film continued to be formulaic: I knew something would stop their fountain side meeting and they would potentially be lost to one another. This is where screenwriting courses and film companies fall short. Rather than being pleased that my supposed audience expectations are met, I felt irritated. I'd have enjoyed the surprise of them meeting as arranged rather than knowing that something would have to stop it … temporarily.

Eileen Atkins, who I think of as Judith Starkadder, also has something nasty in the woodshed to worry about here, but her subplot and the constant ringing of her daughter added only aggravation. Her previous excellent turns such as Miss Deborah of Cranford show that she too is capable of far more than she was given scope for here.

It is nice to see an over 30s couple as the romantic lead, and it's a good film to take those who don’t enjoy bedroom scenes or relationships that are quickly physical. I liked Harvey's insistance that trying a relationships with a stranger was indeed just as real life as Kate's 'Monday morning’. There's realism in not trying to get them too far too soon, not knowing how it would work but simply believing it and trying it. It's perceptive when Kate says 'I'm more comfortable with disappointment'… though the emotion in that moment was reminiscent of Emma's turn in Sense and Sensibility when Mr F proposes.

Although uplifting and quite enjoyable, this is more akin to Father of the Bride but with a more British humour than the thoughtful and moving dramas like Away From Her for which I had hoped.

Words > Elspeth Rushbrook