The Very Thought of You Reviews

He's not Shakespeare, but he's still in love. Ralph Fienne's slightly grungier brother Joseph stars in a charming, if typically implausible, romantic comedy that poses an age old question — if three male friends fall for the same woman, will they still lend each other money? The trio in question are Brits, childhood pals who have grown up to sort of dislike each other, but remain close, essentially out of habit. The plot gets under way when music biz tycoon Daniel (Tom Hollander), whose success doesn't stop him from wearing some of the ghastliest clothes seen in a major motion picture since BREAKIN' 2: ELECTRIC BOOGALOO, has a chance encounter at the Minneapolis airport with Martha (Monica Potter), an American who's doing the adult version of running away from home, in this case to London. Smitten, Daniel makes a lunch date with her, but she stands him up. So Daniel gets together to bemoan the situation with Laurence (Fiennes), who teaches bridge to older women and longs to do something more meaningful, and Frank (Rufus Sewell), an out-of-work, former child star with a really bad attitude. Before long we discover — via an extremely amusing flashback gimmick with a fabulous final twist — that both Laurence and Frank are also involved with Martha. So who'll wind up with the girl? Most sentient mammals will have that figured out before the opening credits have finished, but the cast is aces, and Peter Morgan's screenplay is both very sharp on male sexual politics and crammed with enough comic twists and turns to keep you interested.