Aspect Ratio: 2.35:1 Audience Rating: Suitable for 12 years and over Binding: DVD EAN: 5017188811477 Format: PAL Label: Buena Vista Home Entertainment Manufacturer: Buena Vista Home Entertainment Number Of Discs: 1 Number Of Items: 1 Publisher: Buena Vista Home Entertainment Region Code: 2 Release Date: 2004-02-09 Running Time: 105 Studio: Buena Vista Home Entertainment Theatrical Release Date: 2004-01-01
In the sensible yet elegant hands of actresses Helen Mirren and Julie Walters, Calendar Girls walks a fine line between sappiness and snickering and ends up both wonderfully funny and gently touching. When her best friend Annie (Walters) loses her husband, Chris (Mirren) cooks up a scheme to commemorate him: they and their friends--all fiftysomething women--will make a nude calendar to raise money for the hospital where he died. The calendar becomes hugely popular, but the success may drive a wedge between the two women's friendship. Based on a true story, Calendar Girls carefully balances the stories of several women as it follows the calendar's media explosion, becoming a surprisingly moving fable of loss, determination and the perils of fame. And let's face it--Helen Mirren is one of the wittiest and sexiest women alive, clothes on or not. --Bret Fetzer
Spotlight customer reviews:
Customer Rating: Summary: Numbing Comment: This film is mind numbingly tedious! Plotless titilation of the profoundly indifferent.
It's absolutely implausibly far too long cobbled together nonsense appealing to feminist ideology by presenting itself as some bra burning, or in this case removing, remedy to the place women find themselves in and it just does not work on any level!!
I'm off to burn my jockey shorts and do a calender for the British Legion. Customer Rating: Summary: Considerably bigger buns! Comment: This is a hugely enjoyable film that balances old-fashioned prejudices with daring activism. The WI girls join up to raise money for a sofa for the relatives' room, at the hospital where one of their husbands was treated for leukemia, by posing nude for a calendar. The delightful gung-ho of the girls (especially Helen Mirren's Chris) is tempered by the grief of Julie Walter's character as she misses and pays tribute to her late husband (a moving, lovely performance by John Alderton) and the knock-on effects on members of the womens' families.
Many hilarious scenes are juxtaposed with sad instances of prejudice, the dangers of exploitation and the constant spectre of cancer that both scares the women and spurs them on.
This is a delightful film about a brave, canny, beautiful and downright inspiring group of women. There's more to WI life than making plum jam, baking a victoria sponge and weekly renditions of Jerusalem! Customer Rating: Summary: Good but could have been better Comment: I do like this film but it is very, very American. Why ??
Did any of the classic Ealing comedies cater for Americans. Why do we do this so much.
Apparently Victoria Wood wrote a script of the same story but this one got made because it had an American part to it.
No doubt someone will make Wuthering Heights soon with Heathcliff going to America in his " missing" years.
Helen Mirren and Julie Walters are sooooo good in the film. Customer Rating: Summary: Excellent title to own on dvd Comment: I rarely purchase DVDs of films which I have already watched, and this is one of those few exceptions. The story has a seamless melding of humour, sadness and sensitivity in real life, portrayed by an excellent cast. Strongly recommend this title. Customer Rating: Summary: Brilliant Comment: It took me a long time to watch this movie.
I knew about the story but didn't really fancy it, and I am so glad I overcame my prejudices.
The movie is a touching story of a woman's attempt's (Julie Walters) with the help of her friend (Helen Mirren) to overcome the loss of her husband (Brilliantly acted by John Alderton) to cancer and raise some cash for the local hospital. This they did by posing nude for the local Women's Institue calendar...the rest as they say is history.
The movie is funny, touching, inspirational and pure dead brilliant.
If you haven't seen it - rent it without delay.
So far the calendar and offshoots have raised £1,500, 000 and a new cancer wing for the hospital...
![Calendar Girls [2003]](http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/41EA2E2Y6TL._SL160_.jpg)
