Product Description

Academy Award-winner Jim Broadbent stars as Alfred Salteena, 'an elderly man of 42,' who falls in love with young Ethel Monticue at first sight. To impress her, he treats Ethel to a visit at the sumptuous country house of Lord Bernard Clark, the only lord Alf actually knows. Their ensuing adventures in London's colorful high society reveal the young author's alarmingly keen insights into class, the foolishness of adults and the power that young girls have over men.

DVD Features:
Biographies:Cast/Author bio screens
Featurette:Behind-the-scenes featurette

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #36304 in DVD
• Brand: Warner Brothers
• Released on: 2005-01-11
• Rating: NR (Not Rated)
• Aspect ratio: 1.33:1
• Formats: Closed-captioned, Color, DVD, NTSC
• Original language: English
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 90 minutes

Amazon.com
This peculiar and delightful BBC movie springs from an equally peculiar and delightful novel written in 1890 by a 9-year-old girl and published with her spelling left uncorrected--hence the title, The Young Visiters. Mr. Alfred Salteena (Jim Broadbent, Topsy-Turvy) falls in love with an ambitious young beauty named Ethel (Lyndsey Marshal, The Hours), who only agrees to visit the clumsy and unctuous Alfred if he introduces her to nobility. Alfred cajoles an invitation from Lord Bernard Clark (Hugh Laurie, Stuart Little), whose own interest in Ethel leads him to send Alfred off for lessons in manners, launching Alfred on his own road to high status. The story's mixture of offhand naivete and precocious insights into class results in something daft, funny, and thoroughly charming. Also featuring a delicious turn by Bill Nighy (Love Actually) as the earl who agrees to "rub up" Alfred. --Bret Fetzer

Customer Reviews

Missed the point
This is the second time Daisy Ashford's famous book has been filmed for UK television. Sadly, this is the less succesful version. The whole appeal of the original book was seeing and hearing about the world through the words of a nine year old Victorian girl. Her unique spelling, opinions and ideas - mostly romantic notions about how adults in love behave - make for hilarious reading.

This BBC TV production changes much of the original material to suit it's own purposes, which completely obliterates the artless innocence of the book. Worse still, they have actually made up new lines, supposedly in the style of the original book, and yet actually left out many of Daisy's original and memorable lines of dialogue along the way! They have also added new characters and even devised new mis-spellings that Daisy Ashford never included...what a mistake! It's impossible to embellish a piece of work as original as "The Young Visiters" just for the purposes of padding it out into a full length movie...it's a unique piece of work that sprung from the mind of a nine year old girl, and written circa 1890 - what script writer today could possible emulate that with sufficient accuracy?! So, the overall result is a mildly amusing but perplexing comedy of manners with the characters delivering odd speeches and unfathomable mannerisms, and seemingly unable to spell when they write letters to each other. As a TV programme, it just doesn't make the charm of the book come to life.

The previous version was made way back in 1984 and seems to have disappeared completely now, but it was in fact better than this effort, plus it starred Tracey Ullman, who was hilariously well cast as the pompous Ethel. And the cast got to concentrate much more on the original immortal dialogue, unlike those roped into this mess. None of the humour stands out in the new version, even though it has a stirling cast and a big budget. If you watch this and enjoy it, that's great, but in my opinion the spirit of Daisy Ashford's book has been all but wrung out of it.

Family Entertainment at its Best
It is incredible yet true that "The Young Visiters" was based on a book written by a nine year old in 1890 in twelve days. To be so young and have such sophisticated ability, both as a writer and as a social observer, is remarkable.

This is a charming, family oriented movie that is not a Disney production. It is a "feel good" heart-warming story about a lonely "old" man, Alfred "Alf" Salteena, (age 42) and an ambitious social climber, Ethel Montacue. Alf and Ethel meet on a train, and he deliberately entices her by implying that he hob-nobs with royalty and nobility. Nothing could be farther from the truth as he is in fact a butcher's son, lacking proper manners, etiquette and at a loss what to do or say in almost any social situation. However, he is willing to do whatever it takes to attract and marry Ethel.

Ethel decides to visit him for the purpose of meeting eligible nobility, and in turn he keeps his promise by contacting an earl and arranging for them to visit his palatial estate. Through this connection, everyone's life is changed in unexpected and enchanting ways.

This movie is a wonderful experience and should be enjoyed by all ages. Bill Nighy and Hugh Laurie's performances add sparkle to the story. Whether it is true to the book or as good as a previous version, is irrelevant. On its own it is a marvelous way to spend a few hours.

This Movie is Hilarious and Heart-Warming...
I was delightfully surprised at how funny and touching this movie is. The movie seems as though it is straight out of Tim Burton's mind. Very entertaining and such a fantasy. You need to show your family this movie.