Easy Virtue

I really enjoyed this movie. If there's one thing that I want to see in every movie, it's witty dialogue and I was certainly not disappointed on that front. But with Noel Coward, how could I be? Stephen Elliot assembled the... Full review

There was a share of really well-timed movies depicting the same epoch, like Jeeves and Wooster, for instance, but this one trails mercilessly despite an interesting story and very well set scene design. Despite whet people wrote about J.Biel she gave... Full review

Jessica Biel earns major respect here for taking on a very ambitious task. "Easy Virtue" marks the first time she headlines her own movie, acting alongside powerhouses like Kristin Scott Thomas and Colin Firth. It's based on a stage play by... Full review

Loosely based on Noel Coward play of the same name, directed by Aussie director Stephan Elliot (yes of Priscilla Queen of the Desert), Easy Virtue is simply a cinematic joy. It sings with wit and high camp. The music is infectious...all... Full review

John Whittaker (Barnes) is travelling and falls in love with beautiful American divorcée, Larita (Biel). After spontaneously getting married, John brings her back to his stately home in England, where although many warm to her, she is largely frowned upon –... Full review

Brilliant, sparkling, joyful and sad, passionate and exciting, sweet and sour, elegant, refined and superbly ungraceful at the same time: contrasting adjectives are very fit for this captivating movie, which really hits the mark in a superb way. No flaw is... Full review

When I recently reviewed "Relative Values" I pointed out that it was the first English-language feature film to have been based on a Noel Coward play since the 1960s. That film was not, in my view, a great success, being little... Full review

It is not uncommon in a film to see British "stiff upper lip" challenged and outflanked by an outsider - normally an American. As a Brit you learn to put aside any feelings of protectiveness and sensitivity and try to give... Full review

A bit of an odd one, this. Based on an obscure Noel Coward play (and previously filmed by Hitchcock in 1928 as a silent drama), young John Whittaker arrives back at the family's stately home with his new wife in tow.... Full review

Rather a curate's egg - decidedly mixed. It's not really witty enough for Coward - the first fifteen minutes contain lots of aphorisms that you cannot hear because they are garbled too quickly - and it's not really dramatic enough -... Full review

Easy Virtue' both jaunty and daunting....This movie's insistent Jazz Age lilt is ultimately at odds with a play written.... ... Full Review

Firth is perfectly cast....Elliott is just as precise with the look of the film, combining sleek camerawork with a much-lived-in production design....Director and co-writer Stephan Elliott manages the feat in Easy Virtue , an adaptation of a Noel Coward comedy, making success seem almost effortless.....The film has the same delicious, rebellious fire in its belly as Elliott's breakout, the drag-queen comedy The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert ..... ... Full Review

Jessica Biel, with her hypnotic movie-star smile is totally endearing as the head-turning racing car driver who drives and plays by her own rules.....Kristin Scott Thomas is at her fabulously dour, miserable, and yes, ugly best as mother in law with a plan for her son that specifically excludes Larita -....Easy Virtue is easy to enjoy.....Then there is the marvellous Easy Virtue Orchestra under composer Marius De Vries, which gets an inventive back credit at the end -....Elliott uses some flourishes in givi ... Full Review

Talking pictures To be fair to Jessica Biel, she has matured as an actress.....She's now competent enough to give big-screen (and small-screen) performances that aren't an embarrassment to her or others.....Kris Marshall gets some of the better lines as the Whittaker's pithy butler.....Worse, this film casts the very contemporary looking Biel in period material -....Story continues below Co-screenwriter/director Stephan Elliott's adaptation is full of modern touches that aren't appropriate for the story's 1 ... Full Review

But perhaps the inspired genius of this Easy Virtue is its intoxicating blend of the retro and the up-to-the-moment.....there's anything truly grim about Easy Virtue , just....It would have been wickedly funny and also (or perhaps therefore) entirely free of poop jokes..... ... Full Review

With so many dark titles on their way, there must have been a full moon when this week's releases were scheduled. The biggest movie out tomorrow is - what else? - "X-Men Origins: Wolverine" (PG-13, $29.99), in which we learn... ... Full Article

If you love movies but don't want to go out, September 2009 offers new movies on DVD for your entertainment. They range from romantic comedies to children's movies, action movies to SciFi. ... Full Article

KFD is also launching a nine-print run of Australian director Stephen Elliott 's Easy Virtue [ trailer ], which is full of British humour and adapted from a Noel Coward play. ... Full Article

And it left me cold. It's OK as a 1920s-set frothy comedy of manners, with tunes like "Let's Misbehave" playing in the background. As an attempt to capture the flavor of a certain genre, it's a success. ... Full Article

Mrs. Whitaker, the horrific head of a declining upper-class English household in Noel Coward's 1924 play Easy Virtue , snorts that the name of her new daughter-in-law, Larita, the archetypal woman with a past, is "excellent for musical comedy." ... Full Article

Jessica Biel seems to have two speeds - the girl next door and the bombshell. Recently she attended a screening of her new movie, "Easy Virtue," in the company of several guys, including her boyfriend, Justin Timberlake. ... Full Article