Director: Justin Chadwick
Year Released: 2017
Rating: 1.0
Sophia (Alicia Vikander), who was raised in an orphanage by Judi Dench (!), is married off to the wealthy (and much older) Cornelis (Christoph Waltz), but begins an affair with poor painter Jan (Dane DeHaan) - together, they concoct an inane scheme to fake a pregnancy, fake her death and run off with oodles of guilders made from selling a rare tulip bulb (it's set during the 'tulip mania' market bubble that took place in 17th century Dutch Republic). It had a troubled production history, but no amount of tinkering can fix what amounts to an unimaginative and unconvincing film, with the Vikander-DeHaan 'relationship' never getting close to scintillating and the only successful stabs at humor coming from (the always wonderful) Tom Hollander's hornball Dr. Sorgh (unless you find Waltz giggling about his fickle "little soldier" to be delightful bedroom talk). The script's machinations are so loud that they creak ... but it does end on a positive note for all involved, so that's something worth celebrating, I suppose.
