An existential parable of a wistful journey to ones heady youth with the excitement and bitterness of the time trapped in the mind. A former romance is re-evaluated by the rose coloured filter of time but confronted by the present. Time has moved on but the past has trapped the author. This is wonderfully written and played. Apparently not one word was added or removed from the book/poem of the same name. The words and style encapsulated an era, a culture and a place. From my perspective it was authentic but for a North American audience the language may not travel as well.To enjoy, ignore the characters they are not important, the moment you root for one character over the other the poem will fail (they are called He and She). What is important is the story of the words they are saying to each other. For me I strongly identified with the nostalgic myopia. However I wonder how a younger audience would embrace it? My only criticism was that the colour grading was a little cute.I was captivated by it.

This would have been unwatchable (and even unlistenable) had it not been for Rickman and Thompson. The writing is tedious, clichéd, and overwrought and every "insight" banal. There is even a slight mystery whose solution you can see from space. Why anyone would have decided to film this ridiculous poem is beyond me; I suppose the poet had some good connections. As it is, Rickman is too perfect for the role. His looks and his voice too easily lend themselves to the pathetic and the desperate. He gets to both too quickly, partly because the language and narrative take him there and partly because the language, bad as it is, made me feel worse for him, made me pity him as an actor, thus creating another uncomfortable distraction. All that pity so soon and in one layer too many made me lose patience with the whole production. I kept hoping for something more, thinking that Rickman and Thompson would never have been involved with something this bad unless it offered something real and true. Instead, I think their participation has to do with the work ethic of the English actor: you must never take a break, you must always be acting. And if you can do a well-produced project with another excellent actor, then why not do it? Maybe other friends or respected colleagues were on board. I can't think of any other reasons why Thompson and Rickman would have done this. Sigh.

The title of this review just about says it all. Except, of course, that the two former lovers are portrayed by Emma Thompson and Alan Rickman, who could probably do a satisfying reading of the telephone book. Except that Rickman's character gets drunk and disappears to take a nap on the roof, there isn't much action in this film. The drama lies entirely in the subtle (and not so subtle) interactions of He and She. He appears to be a disappointed academic who would like to rekindle his relationship with She. She is cool, sophisticated, cautious and soon repelled by He's behavior. (Eventually She pays the bill and leaves. ( He, having awakened from his nap finds the table empty.) Not much of a plot to be sure, and the dialog is nothing special. But it is ever a pleasure to watch Thompson and Rickman in action and they inhabit their roles with characteristic conviction. The viewer learns a lot about He and She, not so much from what is said or done, but from how the two actors play off one another.

Well written and extremely well acted but ultimately a very depressing story that, though nicely worded and clever, ultimately is an overwrought adoration of patheticness. Alan Rickman is fabulous as the central character who narrates his own thoughts as they occur to him during his lunch with the equally fabulous Emma Thompason. He reads the lines with such emotion and clarity, the problem is the lines and plot itself. Perhaps I should feel pathos for the central character, and perhaps I am just not "artistic" enough to reflexively identify portrayal of negativity as fine literature, but mostly I just thought what a sad waste of acting talent and thus ultimately unredeeming.