From what I understand the term Mothering Sunday has many meanings from being the day people gave their servants a day off to visit their family or in church the 4th Sunday of Lent or what was to become Mother's Day to honor Mothers. I don't quite know what it has to do with this movie though it deals with 2 mothers who are far from the title characters.



The movie is basically about a maid,(Odessa Young), who has an affair with a rich young man,(Josh O'Connor), both knowing there is no future for them. (Oh yes, both seem very comfortable with their full frontal nudity!)


The story seems to be about 3 different stages in Jane's life--Glenda Jackson, at 86, playing her as an old woman in a very small role--and we are constantly going back and forth in time which seems to be very popular in movies these days and I only find confusing! Though there is a lot about a writer there is more voice-over than writing or story telling and that combined with the constant change of time only makes for a confusing story. I still don't know who O'Connor's parents are!!


The editing doesn't help the movie but I think that is more of the director and screenwriter's fault. The story is all over the place and making it even worse some scenes are just fillers because without so many it would be a very short movie.


This is the second movie in the past year that Olivia Coleman is in a movie that constantly goes back and forth in time but here she only has a cameo and one quick scene with tears that would be effective if we knew more about her (instead of knowing she is the mother of 2(?) dead sons!) Her husband is played by Colin Firth, who I found for the first time not inhabiting a role. For most of the film I had thought they were O'Connor's parents but wrong!


I had suggested to Allen we go see this movie because I had thought it was along the lines of Downton Abbey, Sandition or
Bridgerton which is his sought of go to film but we both agreed the major word for the movie is boring, even in spite of the nudity!


An aside: I might becoming impatient with movies in theatres as I would have fast forwarded through this and seen a good 45 minute movie plus is it really fair to pay $9+ for a movie when you can pay $8.99 for streaming and see 100 movies? Oh, I will never stop going to movie houses to see a movie but I think it will be more in the genre of "The Lost City" which was made for a HUGE screen, saw last week and enjoyed much more than this!