Ordinary Love

This film tells the mundane lives of a married couple, until their world is smashed by cancer. The plethora of emotions are portrayed very well. It is real, raw and very moving. I can relate to every scene, as they look like real life.

It's a lovely, quiet movie. It's how a mature couple would respond to something as dreadful as cancer. In the end, it's their unwavering love for each other with a dash of humor, and sometimes pigheadedness, that wins the day. But, more important, in this time of challenge, they are able to reach out to others in the same situation.

Tom and Joan are a lovely couple. Their acting is so natural, and it's what extraordinary love looks like.

Lisa Barros D'Sa and Glenn Leyburn's 'Ordinary Love' tells exactly the story promised by its title - gently and precisely chronicles a year of crisis in the life of a most ordinary married couple. This might not sound like the most enticing formula but it is a very moving film that cuts straight to the bone and onto the heart without even trying. Liam Neeson and Lesley Manville are superb together. The terrific chemistry between the actors help elevate the story above cancer clichés or cheap sentimentality.

A slow-paced, thoughtful, minutely-observed drama following the progress of a long-married couple after a cancer diagnosis.

Superbly acted, the couple are as familiar to each other as a pair of warm slippers, but their relationship is strained as chemotherapy and the unspoken fear of the final separation take their toll. Hovering behind them throughout everything is the ghost of their daughter, whose death is never explained but who is never far away.

The movie does not rub our noses in medical horrors, but at the same time it faithfully chronicles the process of cancer treatment without ever resorting to sentimentality.

Liam Neeson is a terrific actor. Presumably, a relentlessly low-key movie such as this signifies that he's no longer interested in super-stardom (if indeed he ever was) and is simply doing stuff that he really wants to do. Long may it continue.

Sometimes keeping a film simple and not overdoing it with dramatic music or big set plays actually allows a film to resonate to a larger extent and that's certainly the case here. A reminder that Neeson is actually quite the versatile actor with the right material and a powerful lead alongside him. Emotional and a story that will likely effect most of us at sometime an intelligent, respectful yet all the powerful for it film that did not overstate or understate in any department but struck the perfect tone. Not necessarily for everyone but I for one thought it was fantastic.