Bella Brown had an interesting childhood. As a baby, she was left in a box in park where ducks kept her warm with their bodies until she was eventually discovered and brought to an orphanage. This experience stuck with her, leaving her terrified by the unpredictability of nature. She spends most of her time alone in her room with her books, and developed an obsession with organization and order. As an adult, Bella (Jessica Brown Findlay, Downton Abbey) works in a library. While her attention to detail and precision makes her great at her job, Bella somehow has a difficult time getting to work on time. She is an aspiring writer—who’s never actually written anything—and sometimes gets lost in her own imagination. One fateful day at the library, Bella meets an attractive, somewhat dorky young man named Billy (Jeremy Irvine, Great Expectations), who comes bumbling in looking for books to help him with his technical drawings.
Bella’s next door neighbor, a curmudgeonly old man named Alfie (Tom Wilkinson, Selma), spends his days tending to his lush garden and yelling at his cook, Vernon (Andrew Scott,
Sherlock). One day Alfie gets so upset with Vernon that he fires him, not considering the consequences…that he’ll now have to cook for himself. Vernon, the would-be-laywer, points out that Alfie didn’t give him the proper two weeks notice, and so he’s still on his payroll even if he doesn’t want him to cook.
Meanwhile, Bella’s fear of nature means that she has never properly tended to her property’s garden, and when Alfie notices the state of disrepair that it is in, he contacts the management company to get her evicted for breach of the terms of her rental agreement. However, Vernon once again puts on his lawyer cap and gets Bella a month’s stay of execution…but she’ll need a miracle if she’s going to fix the garden in time in order to reverse the eviction. In the meantime, Vernon offers to cook for Bella since he’s being paid to do so anyway.
Eventually, Alfie’s hunger gets to him and he pleads for his cook to return. So Vernon brokers a deal where he will deliver meals to Alfie in exchange for Alfie lending his expertise to Bella to help her with her garden. And so an unlikely partnership between the neighbors begins.
This Beautiful Fantastic is a charming tale of love, loss, unexpected friendships, and overcoming the things that hold us back from achieving our goals and true happiness in life. The film sets up this beautiful, sometimes fantastical world filled with delightful characters that you quickly become invested in. It’s fun to see these initially love-hate relationships develop into stronger, loving bonds as the characters learn from one another, grow, and break out those shells that hold them back in their lives.
As the film opens, Alfie seems to hate everything but his garden. He has cut himself off from the world, and the only human contact he has is with his doctor Milly (Eileen Davies, Home Fires) and cook Vernon. Meanwhile, Bella has also created a bit of a self-imposed prison for herself. She avoids nature, keeps to herself, keeps everything organized in its proper place, and sticks to a strict schedule and routine. She claims that she wants to be a writer but never actually writes anything. Her world is turned around when these three men come into her life and cause her to break her everyday routine. Vernon is a widower with two young girls who suddenly comes barging into her home one morning to make her breakfast, throwing her tidy and neat kitchen into complete chaos; Billy gives her feelings of love and romance that she has never experienced before; and Alfie forces her to confront her phobia of nature while slowly revealing details of his own life experiences. There’s also this fun relationship between Bella and her frustrated boss (Anna Chancellor, New Blood) who likes to use a message board to tell Bella what she’s doing wrong instead of actually speaking with her. Meanwhile, Bella reminds Alfie about all the wonderful things about life that he had forgotten about, like how human contact and relationships are what make life worth living.
I couldn’t help but be reminded of Amélie while watching this film. While this movie never really gets as surreal as that film, it does have a similar delightful innocence and vibe to it. Jessica Brown Findlay is a joy to watch whenever she appears on screen—Bella doesn’t have a mean bone in her body. Findlay has such great chemistry with co-stars Tom Wilkinson and Andrew Scott, and the three of them together make this fun, quirky family unit—like a daughter, father and grandfather. I am so used to seeing Scott as the conniving, evil Moriarty on Sherlock, so it was refreshing to see him play such a nice, likeable character. Vernon is always positive and rolls with the punches life has given him. This kind of attitude is infectious, and is also one of the things that helps warm the heart of the always-negative Alfie. It’s so much fun seeing Billy and Alfie throw barbs back and forth at one another. And finally, there is also this delightful romance that develops between Bella and Billy, starting with a nice meet-cute at the library.
This film is less about plot and more about the journey these characters are on as they interact and change one another’s lives for the better. The result is fun, highly entertaining, and sometimes emotional story that’s always a visual delight.
This DVD release comes packed in standard keepcase, and includes an insert with a code to redeem for a Digital HD copy of the film. There is no Blu-ray release of this title, so for the purposes of this review, I checked out the HD digital copy. The visual presentation looks fantastic, with a clean, detailed picture and bright, beautiful colors. There is a noticeable uptick in quality between the Digital HD version and the DVD, so I’m really glad Fox included this HD option with the DVD. The audio track is also impressive. There is a scene near the beginning of the film when there is a big storm outside, and the sound of the wind and rain fills the room. All dialogue is easy to understand, and the film’s beautiful score sounds delightful. Unfortunately the only bonus material included is the film’s theatrical trailer.
What’s Included:
Film: (1:32:04)
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DVD:
- 480p / Anamorphic Widescreen 2.35:1
- Audio: English Dolby Digital 5.1
- Subtitles: English SDH, Spanish, French
- Closed Captioned
- Digital HD copy redeemable via Google Play or Vudu (UltraViolet)
Digital HD (Code May Not Be Valid After 2019):
Extras:
- Theatrical Trailer (1:44)
- Sneak Peek (13:52)
Play All or select from trailers for “Discover Digital HD”, Hidden Figures, A United Kingdom, Table 19, All Nighter and A Royal Night Out.
Final Thoughts:
This Beautiful Fantastic is a delightful film that takes viewers on a journey along with the main characters as they form an unconventional family unit, and teach one another to grow and escape from the things that are holding them back from fully enjoying life. It features stellar performances by Jessica Brown Findlay, Tom Wilkinson and Andrew Scott, as well as some fun supporting cast. The DVD includes an HD digital copy that looks and sounds excellent, but unfortunately this bare-bores release includes no supplemental material. That said, the film itself makes this release worth checking out.
