My House In Umbria came to my attention, not because I subscribe to HBO, but because of it's many nominations at the Golden Globes. It's one of those slow-moving acting-oriented Merchant Ivory type of films that was interestingly similar in many respects to Under The Tuscan Sun.

My House In Umbria is tailor-made for the Grand Dame of such cinema Maggie Smith, she is the film's hub and narrator as the story plays out. She plays an outspoken, grappa guzzler, whose fortune she's earned as a successful pulp-romance novelist who also owns a House in Umbria Italy. The house sometimes doubles as a restaurant and/or bed and breakfast that caters to a select few guests. The film starts with Smith in a train car, imagining back-stories for her various fellow passengers, one of which is an 8 year old blonde girl, whom, as it turns out is one of 4 survivors of a lethal explosion. Getting to the bottom of who planted the device and why is part of the story here, but not a substantial one. This scene was very well shot, unfolding in a surreal way that made you question what was going on - was this more imagination?

It's not long after that Emily wakes up in a hospital, battered and bloodied, that she is astounded to discover that the bomb has claimed the lives of all of her fellow passengers save three - a retired British General (Ronnie Barker, "Robin and Marian"), a German tourist named Werner (Benno Furmann, "The Princess and the Warrior") and the aforementioned beautiful child who turns out to be an American girl named Aimee (Emmy Clarke).

As it turns out all of these survivors are now orphaned or bereft of family to care for them and so she invites everybody back to her estate in the country to recover in some amount of luxury. As you might imagine they have also formed the beginnings of filial bonding. Soon a detective, Girotti (Giancarlo Giannini, who was so wonderful in Hannibal), shows up to investigate the explosion. Uneasy and quiet at first, the survivors soon discover that they are happiest in each other's company and begin to rely on each other to get through the traumatic event. Much of their contentment and hope for the future is embodied in the enchanting young Aimee.

As it turns out young Aimee, traumatized but getting better "does" have an uncle played by the impeccable Chris Cooper, who lives in America and has long been estranged from Aimee's mother because of a family dispute. Cooper is at his most restrained and muted as a professor who is an authority of worker ants. When he appears in order to claim Aimee and take her away from the group, the tension begins to mount as it becomes obvious to everyone watching that Aimee would be much better off staying with Smith than being torn away to live with the emotionally closed off Uncle. And much of the film centers around Smith's efforts to find a shred of parental aptitude in this man, but mostly to convince him that Aimee should remain in Italy, at least for the time being.

There is also a radical-politics sub-plot that happily is downplayed and for the most part this is just a very charming way to spend and hour and a half. Dame Maggie has completely outdone herself in "My House In Umbria." She is warm, complex, not to be messed with and her narration in the parlance of her romance novels is very literate and only occasionally cheesy. Her character we find in flashback form had a most unpleasant childhood and the love of her life was taken from her by tragedy. Thus as we're led to figure out she's since lived her romantically life vicariously through her novels.

Her house in Umbria becomes a place of convalescence and wonder and you will be loathe to leave it. The cast is incredible, the writing solid, the cinematography breathtaking and director Richard Loncraine understands exactly how to get the best out of his cast and crew. I won't give away the ending, but suffice it to say that it provoked a salty drop or too from my poor old ducts.