Keeping Mum

last updated 8 January 2015

'œKeeping Mum is frothy, good-hearted fun that reminds you of the kind of movies we're always complaining they don't make anymore,' said Jack Matthews in the New York Daily News. The film begins with a flashback, in which a young woman is arrested when police discover the dismembered bodies of her husband and his mistress in her luggage trunk. Four decades later, an older woman named Grace (Maggie Smith) carries the same trunk into the English village of Little Wallop, population 57. She's here as the new housekeeper for the local vicar, Walter Goodfellow (Rowan Atkinson), whose family troubles are becoming unmanageable. But as soon as Grace arrives, Mary Poppins'“like, things start to go right for the Goodfellows, said Stephen Holden in The New York Times. The barking dog that keeps Gloria (Kristin Scott Thomas) up at night suddenly disappears, and 13-year-old Petey's bullies are sidelined in a suspicious bicycle accident. Like Arsenic and Old Lace, this movie delights in its lovable serial killer. For Smith, 'œthe role of a genteel psychopath is a piece of lemon tea cake she consumes in one delicate bite.' The other actors are brilliant too, in such a British way, said John Anderson in Newsday. Thomas is sexy flirting with her American golf teacher (Patrick Swayze), and Atkinson is better than usual, stifling his rubber-faced tendencies. Director Niall Johnson 'œisn't striving for a masterpiece, just something clever, unpredictable, and human.' He gets it just right.

Rating: R