I think this is a new genre that they're all sort of working their way through it and haven't got all the kinks worked out yet but it's a genre that works for me.

One of the worst movies I've ever seen

Load of rubbish!!

It is a whirlwind of delight --- attractive actors, stunning couture, spectacular sets and outrageous parties. It's a feast for the eyes. But what really makes this dramedy work is the acting.

In one sense this is two films in one, always difficult to pull off and more so when the contrast is so startling; for two thirds of the running time we're comfortably ensconced in the thirties and living the privileged life vicariously largely via the Lasts (James Wilby and Kristin Scott-Thomas) who rattle around with their small son in a Gothic pile except when Brenda (Scott-Thomas) is up in Town banging her sponging lover (Rupert Graves). The main problem here is that there is insufficient contrast between Wilby and Graves to convince us why Scott-Thomas elected him as a lover (I'm speaking of course merely about external appearance and outward behaviour; Beaver may well have been exceptional in bed but nothing about him hinted at excitement, in fact he and Wilby could easily have passed for brothers, and in those days Brenda would have no other yardstick). There's also a symbolic element which tends to be heavy-handed; having encountered an eccentric named Dr Messenger (geddit) Wilby decides more or less on the spot to underwrite the Dr's expedition to South America and go along himself for the ride so that the heavy-handed point being made is that he is leaving a moral jungle for a tangible one. The last third of the film finds him in the jungle, stricken with fever, left alone by Messenger who is never able to get the help he went in search of, and 'saved' by Tod (German for 'death') a white man gone native played by Alec Guinness, who cynically keeps him a prisoner in all but name. As we might expect with actors of this calibre the acting is first class as is the period feel and if you can accept the wrench from Shires to Jungle you may well enjoy it.

I decided to watch this purely on account of the magnificent cast, not realising it was another Evelyn Waugh adaptation. Maybe if I'd known, I wouldn't have bothered because I absolutely HATED Brideshead Revisited, also directed by Charles Sturridge. Perhaps the necessary compactness of a film adaptation compared to the lumbering drawn-out length of the Brideshead TV-series is what made it work for me.What a magnificent film this is: sensitively directed, beautifully shot and the amazing cast absolutely spot-on. The understated performances of James Wilby and Kristin Scott Thomas as the two doomed main characters are just perfect to make this strange story come to life. The stellar supporting cast all add up to a feast of fine acting.In my opinion, AN UNDERRATED MASTERPIECE.

My personal opinion is that the acting in this film is brilliant and Evelyn Waugh would have been proud! It's true that the humour in the book has been toned down but everything else is there. And as for the acting - just witness Kristin Scott Thomas' amazing performance running the gammut of emotions all at once when she realises it isn't her lover but her son who has died. First there is fear, then relief, then guilt at her relief. Also James Wilby portraying a father dealing with grief yet trying to maintain the British stiff-upper lip. This is what real acting is about. Brilliant stuff. Now all we need is a decent DVD release. The German British import is a travesty with poor sound, the wrong aspect ratio, and a battered source print. Very sad.

The filmmakers of 'A Handful of Dust' are the same creative dynamos behind the hugely popular 'Brideshead Revisited'. They take the approach they took to 'Brideshead', which Waugh wrote when he was happy, with 'Dust', a novel which Waugh wrote when he wife was cheating on him and when he hated his life. 'Brideshead' was a much happier novel, and many purists consider it not to be a good work of Waugh's because it is lacking the acidic wit, satire and disgust of his characters which can be found in many (though not all) of his works. 'Brideshead' is a slow novel, something which most Waugh novels aren't, and comes as close as Waugh ever came to writing a soap opera. So, instead of giving us a sharp, nasty satire, which the novel itself is, we get a blander, kinder and very unfunny version of the novel. The moral bankruptcy of the characters, more or less the point of the whole novel, is hardly registered. The characters are having a "jolly good time" doing some bad things, but Sturridge and the two other writers (!) don't convey that what their characters are doing is bad. They skip over it, and instead spend all their time in giving away plot twists in the beginning of the film, to create "suspense", and restructuring the film, so all the unimportant scenes get maximum screen time. Even with the nice scenery, the film lacks the speed and fragmentary narrative of the novel, one of the reasons why the novel was considered so revolutionary, and comes across as a blah, nearly witless, edited-for-TV episode of Masterpiece Theater, instead of the theatrical film which it is and should be. This shouldn't come as a surprise, though: 'Brideshead Revisted' aired for months on Masterpiece Theater. The actors, though many are miscast, do their best, most of the technical aspects are there in some form, but the real problem lies with the filmmakers and their unwillingness to make a film which might be dark, mean or angry.