It was another trip to Cineworld yesterday to see Mrs Harris Goes To Paris starring Lesley Manville, Isabelle Huppert and Lambert Wilson.
This latest adaptation of Paul Gallico‘s delightful book, Mrs ‘Arris Goes to Paris, tells the story of Mrs Harris (played by Lesley Manville) a 50s widowed cleaning lady who is down on her luck and struggling to make ends meet, then one day at one of the houses she cleans she sees a beautiful Christian Dior dress and decides that she wants one of her own, but back then the only place you could buy a Dior designed dress was in Paris, so Mrs Harris sets her sites on making her way to the City of Love to buy herself the dress.
If you have seen the 1992 adaptation of Gallico’s book you will be familiar with the story, the previous version starred the wonderful Angela Landsbury as Mrs ‘Arris and I really enjoyed that version, so I was really looking forward to this latest adaptation of the book and I wasn’t disappointed.
Soon luck is on her side and she is able to not only afford the trip to Paris but have enough to buy a dress, but just buying a dress isn’t as simple as she may think and she is met with the snobbery of a simple worker wanting to have such a fantastic garment.
Mrs Harris Goes to Paris has a superb cast including Jason Isaacs as Archie who certainly seems to have a soft spot for Mrs Harris, Lambert Wilson (who you will recognise from The Matrix Resurrections) as the French aristocrat Marquis de Chassagne and let’s not forget Lesley Manville who steals the film with her excellent performance in the lead role of Ada Harris.
Manville is a pure joy to watch and brings the character to life on the screen in such a way that you feel that you have known her all your life, there are so many lovely moments throughout the film that she shines, such as the looks she has on her face of the wonders of the Paris skyline at night and the look of shock at the rubbish piling up on the pavements of Paris due to the strike that the bin men were on.
The movie looks great on the big screen, the production uses most of the 2.39:1 ratio, but there are some slight goofs that I did notice that grabbed my attention straight away such as a scene at the dog track, the movie was set in 1957 and the seating didn’t look of the time and looked very modern, it did through me off slightly, but besides that Mrs Harris Goes to Paris is a movie that is so enjoyable to watch and it’s the chance to escape the world for almost two hours to a charming and delightful story that really plucks on the heartstrings.
It’s so nice to have a film like this out in the cinema, it’s a lovely change from all the action, horror and Sc-Fi, it’s also nice to see a film come out like this that fills up the seats in the cinemas, during the screening I went to yesterday there were far more people there than I have seen in a long time and majority of them were over the age of 55-60, I can see Mrs Harris Goes to Paris being very popular throughout its theatrical run and no doubt there will be many that will be buying it when it has a home release as well.
Director Anthony Fabian has done a wonderful job bringing the book to the screen, the characters are a joy to watch and the casting is perfectly set for the movie, if you want a charming movie that will whisk you away for a short while then this is a movie that you will want to check out on the big screen.
A charming and delightful movie
Movie title: Mrs Harris Goes to Paris (2022)
Movie description: A widowed cleaning lady in 1950s London falls madly in love with a couture Dior dress, and decides that she must have one of her own.
Date published: October 1, 2022
Country: UK
Duration: 1h 55m
Director(s): Anthony Fabian
Actor(s): Lesley Manville, Isabelle Huppert, Lambert Wilson
Genre: Comedy, Drama
Summary
A wonderful movie that is a delight to watch, my fingers are crossed that some of the other stories of Mrs Harris are brought to the big screen.
Karen Woodham is the founder and owner of the Blazing Minds. She is also a Cinema reviewer and works with RealD 3D reviewing the latest 3D releases and IMAX, she has also had several articles published in various publications including the first edition of SFW Magazine. In 2015 she became an Award Winning Blogger and also has her website listed as one of the UK’s Top 10 Film Blogs.
