kikkapi20 Throughly enjoyed this film. The characters married beautifully to such a deliciously scribed plot, and were oh so believable... even the cringe factor worked - when gorgeous Tamara stoops well short (way shorter than her short shorts-geez if only i could pull that look off...) and sleeps with the guy who reminds me of Christopher Hitchens (... nice brain - ah, Hitchens, that is, but shame about the rest...)... and the schoolgirls - oh..the two teenage girls totally carried this movie they were AWESOME !! Anybody who did not enjoy this movie hasn't been around. The various characters - the lecherous writer, the 'put upon' housewife, the rock star and the hotel licensee were fantastically observed characters. I loved it!

Paul-257-230661 If you liked the Tamara Drewe serialisation in the Guardian or bought the graphic novel or are just a fan of Posy Simmonds, prepare to be disappointed.In the first place, the film is the original work forced into the straitjacket of "comedy". This means the original ending has been totally re-written, since teenage girls dying of solvent abuse isn't something that could be played for laughs, not to mention the possibility of messing up the certification. It also means some characters are made into clownish caricatures, principally supposed indie drummer Ben Sergeant whom Dominic Cooper plays as some ridiculous greaseball rock-n-roller so that we might believe the writers' last experience of popular music was going to see David Essex in That'll Be The Day in 1973. Barden and Christie also overplay the teenage awkwardness of Jody and Casey to the extent that Charlotte Christie at times seems to lumber about like Frankenstein's Igor, which leads to the second problem: mis-casting.Gemma Arterton is pretty. Luke Evans is good, Bill Camp is good, the others are all wrong. See above for Dominic Cooper. Tamsin Greig is too hot to be frumpy fifty-something Beth but Roger Allam not hot enough to be her philandering husband: he has a face that says "Harrumph" and its hard to believe a queue of younger women are waiting to bed him. Bronagh Gallagher is added as another clown whose Ian Paisley voice doesn't work among the up themselves novelists.The film is a bimbo. It's not so bad if you want a few giggles with darling scenery, screwball characters and a pretty actress who looks nice with not much on, but if you actually want an adaptation, stay away.

The_Movie_Cat As the film itself would have it, then storytellers (or in this case advertising men) are "thieves and liars". It's a shame, because the trailers and promotional material ahead of this movie's release would have appeared to have harmed it greatly. While the exact budget for Tamara Drewe isn't readily available, you'd suspect that it didn't exactly make a fortune for the studio by only taking in around £7.6 million worldwide.Tamara Drewe isn't a great film, or a particularly unique one. Yet it also isn't, crucially, the film it's purported to be in the cinemas. While the people who DID pay to see it could rightfully have felt aggrieved that it wasn't a Curtisesque knockabout comedy full of "hilarious" middle class eccentrics, the greater number who didn't go to see it, possibly in the believe that it WAS a Richard Curtis-like movie, did miss out on something... pretty okay. Or "decent" as another character in the movie would have it.Gemma Arterton looks stunning in the film, and her sexuality was made much of in the trailer. But the central character is, in many ways, Tamsin Greig's broken wife Beth. It'd be equally unfair to call this film "dark", but it's more of a drama with some so-so humorous moments than the "laugh riot for the easily amused" that the promotion would attest. It's certainly no bleak Ken Loach exploration of the fractured human psyche, but picture if Loach himself had undergone this treatment... picture Kes, with the scenes where Billy talks about female and male budgies, or that bit where he shows his scrotum off as he climbs over the shower. Now picture those clips spliced together, with every single reaction shot in the picture taken out of context and placed in between. Now imagine a jaunty, catchy pop number - say, Lily Allen's "The Fear" - placed underneath. For the icing on the cake, picture an uptempo US voice-over telling us about "young Billy Casper and his kerazeeeeeeeee kestrel..." It places a whole different tone on events, doesn't it?No, Tamara Drewe ISN'T up there with Loach works. And no, it's not especially deep, meaningful or insightful. Hell, it's not even particularly worth seeing. But if you do happen to catch it, you might find yourself enjoying its inoffensive escapades and musing over the fact that it's not the film you thought it would be.

CountZero313 The idyllic monotony of a Dorset village is disrupted by the return of Tamara, sporting a re-modelled nose, but unreformed distaste for her home town. Her presence revives long-buried passions for handyman Andy, and minted author of "airport fodder" Nicholas, as well as sparking new intrigue for various other inhabitants of the village, including a blocked American writer, and two bored schoolgirls.So who is the film about? Everybody and nobody: don't be mislead by the title into thinking that Tamara will drive the narrative. She is more 'done to' than 'doing', and that is one of the film's main failings - quite why anyone is doing what they are doing remains a mystery, most of all Tamara. She resists the obvious attraction to Andy in favour of a soiled, sneering, effete drummer, and then tops that in the disgust stakes by shacking up with the repugnant chinny Nicholas. The lack of character development means this fails to function as a drama, and it was not till after the film was over and I took a look at the DVD case that I realised they are pushing this as a 'comedy.' I didn't laugh once.The acting is fairly good and Dorset looks nice. The drummer, two schoolgirls, Nicholas and weekend crime novelists are annoying. Andy and Tamara lack depth and never change. Wife Beth and the American writer have some intrigue to them, but their particular romantic tale gets lost in the rest of the twee village rambunctiousness. This story might function well as a village hall amateur dramatic production, but it isn't cinematic. A surprising mis-fire from Frears.