"Love of My Life" (Guardian 17/02/17)

Love of My Life **

Dir: Joan Carr-Wiggin. With: Anna Chancellor, John Hannah, Hermione Norris, James Fleet. 106 mins. Cert: 15
 
This creaky curio exiles Brits to Toronto to enact a necromantic tangle: architect Anna Chancellor finds her domestic complacency with ambulant cardigan James Fleet disrupted first by a terminal cancer diagnosis, then the reappearance of roguish novelist ex John Hannah. Nudging the dial towards bad taste might have been interesting – it’s partly couched as a fight for sexual bragging rights, with Hannah claiming “first dibs on the last fuck”. Director Joan Carr-Wiggin plumps for bookclub cosiness, alas, leaving every sitcom set-up resembling farce without the energy. The actors strive to give it spark and emotional amplitude, but the script barely seems to understand how humans exist hour-by-hour, let alone in moments of mortal crisis. 

Love of My Life opens in selected cinemas from today.