LOVE SARAH

UK, 2020, 97 minutes, Colour.
Celia Imrie, Shelley Conn, Shannon Tarbet, Rupert Penry- Jones, Bill Patterson.
Directed by Eliza Schroeder.

If you have ever dreamed of cleaning up a shambles store-space, setting up bakery with specialised cakes, of opening a tea room, Love Sarah is definitely your film. And if you have never had these dreams, Love Sarah is also a film for you. It has sadness, happiness, cuteness, sentiment, and enthusiasm. By the way, Love Sarah is the name of the tearoom situated in a London suburban street.

At the end of the film, the name of the producing company appears, Femme Films. And that is very true – this is very much a women’s film, the director, the three central characters, men in supporting roles, a paternity question. And all in London, very British, attractive for those who live in London, and an engaging set of memories for those who ever lived there or visited.

The sadness is fairly instant. A woman in her 40s has died. She and her friends had done cooking training in Paris some decades before and were now in a position to set up their own bakery. The three women who loved her are her mother, Mimi (Celia Imrie), her daughter Clarissa (Shannon Tarbert) and her best friend, Isabella (Shelley Conn). They are faced with a challenge and each responds in her own way. Isabella is the driving force but feels she is not expert chef enough for the project. Mimi has been alienated from her daughter and the younger women try to persuade her to become involved. Clarissa, a ballet student, experiences a breakup and moves back with her grandmother.

The performances of the three women are engaging, especially Celia Imrie, a past high-wire artist (who does have a moment to illustrate that even, elderly, she could still pose on the trapeze). Celia Imrie reminds us that she was in the Best Marigold hotels films – and this audience is definitely a target for Love Sarah.

And the supporting men? Rupert Penry- Jones is Matthew, a top chef, who trained with the two women, was in a relationship with Clarissa’s mother, feels the need for something new in his cooking life, wants to be associated with the women again. While he might have had his caddish moments in the past, he is more genial now (as has been Rupert Penry-Jones’? past screen presence, playing a number of cads).

Across the street from the tea and cakes lives an eccentric elderly gentleman, Felix, Bill Patterson. He calls by, watches the shop out his window, attracts the attention of Mimi who discovers he is an inventor, even eager to set up a security system in Love Sarah.

Much of what we might expect from such a scenario takes place: few customers initially, the baking of beautiful cakes (who are very well prepared for their frequent close-ups), visitors, lucky opportunities…

In fact, commendably, the film’s and Mimi’s creative brainwave faces the fact that London is a multi-multi-cultural place in that many who have come to the UK have a yearning for the pastries of the past, their past. And, commercially, this provides a bonanza.

This is definitely a feel-good film and so it ends for each of the characters feeling good – as we do as we leave the cinema.

1. A pleasing British story? The focus on the women? The female director and her sensitivity?

2. The London settings, the many vistas of the city, homes, the streets, Notting Hill, the interior of the shop? The Time Out filming? The musical score?

3. The introduction, Sarah, her relationship with the other women, her untimely death? The consequences? The intentions of starting the bakery? Signing the documents with Isabella? The dilemmas? Clarissa, memories of her mother, deciding to collaborate with Isabella? Clarissa staying with her grandmother, persuading her to invest in the store? The bad memories of the separation between grandmother and mother?

4. Filling in the backgrounds of the women? Isabella, financial world? Wanting to bake, not confident, relying on Sarah? The approach to Clarissa? Clarissa, her ballet training, her boyfriend, his breaking up with her, her moving back to her grandmother’s? Mimi, show business, the trapeze act, the photos?

5. The decision to open the shop? The hard work in the renovation of the store? Matthew and his arrival? His place in the past? The relationship with Sarah? The training to be cooks in Paris? Relationship with Isabella? The paternity issue and whether he was Clarissa’s father? His motivations for coming? Getting the hair, the DNA test? Matthew and Clarissa getting the final information? The importance for Clarissa and her concern about not knowing her father?

6. Matthew and his skills? The audition, the range of cakes? The menu? Customers to drop in? Coffee or tea? The first day, no customers, Felix and his looking in the window, coming in to say hello? The slow drift of customers?

7. The focus on the cakes, the range, beauty, the close-ups?

8. The customer with the child, the discussions about ethnic backgrounds, countries of origin, tastes and cakes? Mimi fostering the idea? The number of contacts, the interrogations, from the Baltic countries, from Asia…? More customers coming? Placing orders, bulk orders?

9. The relationship between Matthew and Isabella, her reticence, his affirming her skills? The night together? Her discovering that the restaurant was headhunting him? The break? Hostility? His apology, the reconciliation?

10. Clarissa and Mimi, maybe going to the dance class, her posing on the trapeze, memories of her past? The discussions between grandmother and granddaughter?

11. The customer, the bulk order? Her being with Time Out, the decision to do a feature, the camera crew coming, the performance?

12. Felix, eccentric, inventor, looking out his window across the street to the shop, visiting, Mimi and the cakes, the flowers, his inviting her out to the opera? A relationship?

13. Clarissa going back to dance classes, Mimi finding new life in the shop, Isabella and Matthew together? A feelgood film – for the audience to feel good as they left the cinema?