The film is based on 17-year-old Cassandra Mortmain. She was already struggling to survive in a corrupt English castle in the 1930s. Over a troubled six-month period, Cassandra tries to try her experience frankly through the great changes taking place inside the castle walls.
Dollops on the usual romantic, family and class conflicts with a very heavy ladle, which pretty much smothers the whimsical mood Fywell strains so hard to attain.
The fancy-pants accents and period costuming make one feel intellectually smug, as if the afternoon had been spent watching a Merchant-Ivory film - only without the tedium of actually sitting through a Merchant-Ivory film.
The filmmakers can't seem to unearth the novel's inherent lightheartedness and instead treat too many events with earnest seriousness, trampling the original story's lively spirit in heavy-handed drama.
