Good Luck To You, Leo Grande (15)

Charming sex worker Leo arrives at the hotel room of widowed former RE teacher Nancy Stokes, who has only had one sexual partner: her late husband. Free from the shackles of a boring marriage, Nancy impulsively hires Leo for one night of self-discovery and pleasure in the hope that he might help her achieve the impossible - an orgasm. Initial awkwardness between Leo and his client melts as he gets to know Nancy and better understand her desires.

LondonNet Film Review

Good Luck To You, Leo Grande (15) Film Review from LondonNet

Let’s talk about sex. Scriptwriter Katy Brand certainly does, in amusingly graphic detail, in a sensual, empowering and thoroughly feel-fabulous comedy drama about a retired religious education teacher seeking her first orgasm and the charming escort hired to shepherd her to nirvana. Isabella Laughland appears briefly as a former pupil in an uplifting final act but Good Luck To You, Leo Grande is essentially a two-hander between Emma Thompson and Daryl McCormack that relishes the verbal foreplay between richly drawn characters at very different stages of their lives…

Despite the provocative subject matter, director Sophie Hyde sidesteps mere titillation to address timely issues of body self-image, shame and sex positivity head-on, including heated scenes of intimacy that venerate the architecture of the human body and our capacity to receive and give pleasure. Brand’s dialogue occasionally fakes an orgasm in pursuit of a punchline, like when Thompson’s widow second-guesses her decision to hire a sex worker young enough to be her son and babbles aloud, “I’m a seedy old pervert. I feel like Rolf Harris all of a sudden!” Missteps are exceedingly rare and Thompson and McCormack are beautifully matched. The balance of power in their on-screen relationship subtly shifts over the course of the film as his tenderness and heartfelt compliments dismantle decades of self-doubt and denial.

Nancy Stokes (Thompson) has only one notch on her bed post – her late husband – and for 31 unremarkable years their nocturnal couplings never made the headboard move let alone the Earth. “I made a decision after my husband died never to fake an orgasm again,” she politely explains to Leo (McCormack), who Nancy hires for one night of furtive self-discovery.

Initial awkwardness melts as Leo gets to know Nancy and better understand her physical needs, raising a toast “to being empirically sexy” with champagne from the hotel mini bar. Their free-flowing conversation touches upon fantasies and desires (Nancy has an achievable checklist) and the widow is visibly shocked when Leo discloses the age of his oldest client. “Eighty-two?!” she gasps, having previously fixated on the age gap between her and Leo. “I’m feeling a bit better now.”

Set almost entirely in a well-appointed hotel room, Good Luck To You, Leo Grande champions the power of human connection – physical, emotional and spiritual – to allay fears and deep-rooted insecurities. Thompson is luminous, laying herself bare in every sense as Nancy crosses a threshold to vulnerability in a safe space of her own choosing. Chemistry with McCormack sizzles, building to a simple yet devastatingly effective scene of acceptance and glowing self-appreciation which confront unrealistic ideals that proliferate in the media. Every body type is sexy and Hyde’s picture pops a champagne cork in glorious affirmation.

– Jo Planter