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Wetherby

R 1985 1h 43m Drama List
67% Tomatometer 12 Reviews 46% Popcornmeter 500+ Ratings
It all starts simply enough. Schoolteacher Jean Travers (Vanessa Redgrave) invites some friends over for a dinner party. The evening concludes. The next day, one of the guests, a mysterious young man (Tim McInnerny) whom she had assumed was invited by one of her friends, returns to her doorstep. She fixes tea; he kills himself in front of her. As the police investigate the dead man's life, Jean begins to obsess over an ill-fated love affair in her own past.

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Wetherby

Critics Reviews

View All (12) Critics Reviews
Jill Forbes Sight & Sound Where it succeeds is in the extraordinarily brilliant casting and the handling of the shifts from past to present. Where it is less fluent, perhaps, is in the statement of a case. Feb 10, 2020 Full Review Variety Staff Variety The skill of Hare's approach is that he initially allows us to assume, via normal cinema techniques, that what we saw of the dinner party was the whole story. Mar 26, 2009 Full Review Nicholas Royle Time Out Redgrave's performance is superb and she's ably supported by Holm, Dench, and Hamilton in particular. Jan 26, 2006 Full Review Stephen Schiff Vanity Fair The trouble with Wetherby is that, unlike Pinter's creepy exercises, it turns out to be that dreary thing, a wellmade play: a theatrical puzzler with a solution that, when it arrives, seems at once obvious and not particularly helpful. Jul 10, 2019 Full Review TV Guide There are more questions asked than answered in this movie, but the mental gymnastics are well worth the effort. Rated: 3/4 Mar 2, 2015 Full Review Lori Hoffman Atlantic City Weekly Rated: 4/5 Jan 11, 2007 Full Review Read all reviews

Audience Reviews

View All (12) audience reviews
Audience Member Deeply love this film, the actors' performances and dramatist David Hare...a quiet masterpiece. Rated 4.5 out of 5 stars 01/17/23 Full Review Audience Member The non-linear structure takes some getting used to, but this is a really well-made drama with interesting characters and dialogue. Vanessa Redgrave did a sterling job as the school teacher Jean trying to come to terms with her past. I also really liked Joely Richardson playing young Jean in the 1950s. Rated 4 out of 5 stars 01/23/23 Full Review Audience Member Wow, was this boring...and confusing. It starts with a group of people, five of which being some true Hollywood legends, only younger, eating dinner and then the next morning the unfamous one, admits that he was neither a guest nor invited the night before and blows his head off. Nice gore effect bt the way. The rest of the film is sometimes the direct events leading up to the dinner, sometimes the events after dealing with the Police trying to find out why he killed himself, while there is also a good deal of flashbacks to when our hostess was a younger woman. I still have zero idea why he killed himself, or why showing her younger self basically being a slut had anything to do with it. Maybe it was explained, and I was too busy watching some paint dry? I did find it interesting that our lead is played by Vanessa Redgrave and her younger self is Joely Richardson; who would later end up being mother/daughter on Nip/Tuck, but that has nothing to do with this movie. Seeing younger versions of Redgrave, Holm, Dench and Wilkinson was nice, and dang Joley was crazy gorgeous as well(still is), but I just couldn't get into the story. Maybe someone can someday respond and explain what exactly happened? Rated 2 out of 5 stars 01/27/23 Full Review Audience Member An interesting build up and retracing of the steps leading up to the tragedy. This film however suffers from dull hanging in periods of tepid dialogue and useless plot development. Partially saved by solid acting, it nonetheless is not particularly memorable. Rated 3 out of 5 stars 02/07/23 Full Review Audience Member Incredibly, despite amazing cast, this is more fartsy than artsy. Well-suited to the stage but cinematically lifeless. Rated 1 out of 5 stars 02/08/23 Full Review Audience Member A strange and interesting British film. Another that affects the subconscious more than anything. A film about a mystery but is more a sombre moody character film. Rated 3 out of 5 stars 02/26/23 Full Review Read all reviews
Wetherby

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Movie Info

Synopsis It all starts simply enough. Schoolteacher Jean Travers (Vanessa Redgrave) invites some friends over for a dinner party. The evening concludes. The next day, one of the guests, a mysterious young man (Tim McInnerny) whom she had assumed was invited by one of her friends, returns to her doorstep. She fixes tea; he kills himself in front of her. As the police investigate the dead man's life, Jean begins to obsess over an ill-fated love affair in her own past.
Director
David Hare
Screenwriter
David Hare
Production Co
Film 4, Greenpoint Films
Rating
R
Genre
Drama
Original Language
English
Release Date (Streaming)
Dec 30, 2020
Box Office (Gross USA)
$1.1M
Runtime
1h 43m
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