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First Night

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United Kingdom · 2010
1h 56m
Director Christopher Menaul
Starring Richard E. Grant, Peter Basham, Sarah Brightman, Edyta Budnik
Genre Comedy, Music, Romance

Adam is a rich industrialist, who aspires to a more cultured world. Spurred on by playful jibes that he is little more than a city suit living the capitalist's dream, this frustrated amateur opera singer decides to throw an opera in his lavish country retreat. Once his friends see him belting out the notes, he feels sure it will spell the end to their shallow taunts. In fact, it might even help him win the hand of a female conductor he has been pursuing whom - it just so happens - is the first to be recruited for his showpiece

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What are critics saying?

40

Time Out London by

The standard of acting is poor beyond belief. What happened to Grant’s career that he should be in the likes of this?

25

Slant Magazine by Drew Hunt

The political dynamic that underpins The Rules of the Game is nonexistent in 1st Night, which is fixated entirely on the zany sexcapades of its characters.

40

Total Film by Emma Dibdin

It’s to director Chris Menaul’s credit that his lack of big-screen experience isn’t evident, but the same can’t be said for his cast who are, by and large, too stiff to charm.

30

Village Voice by Pete Vonder Haar

The depressingly predictable script—and tendency of everyone involved to jump to ridiculous conclusions—suggests a combination of Noises Off at best, and at worst, Three's Company.

30

The New York Times by Stephen Holden

If 1st Night had a glint of social satire, it might have amounted to something more than a frivolous fatuity. But it plays as an arch, hammily acted farce.

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