If you blinked, you probably missed seeing this whimsical adaptation of a Noel Coward play when it was in theaters. Kim and I watched it this weekend on On Demand and thoroughly enjoyed being transported back to the era of the Lost Generation with the likes of Kristin Scott Thomas, Jessica Biel, Ben Barnes and an always-scrumptuous Colin Firth.

The premise: Stodgy British family with dysfunction as sizable as their sprawling estate grudgingly welcomes their spirited, scandalous siren of a daughter-in-law to the fold when prodigal son (Barnes) returns married to a gorgeous American race car driver (Biel).

What we loved: Firth and Thomas were naturally top-notch, and Jessica Biel managed to hold her own as the quirky-but-beautiful fish out of water. Her clothes alone are worth moving this one to the top of your Netflix queue. We also got a kick out of the soundtrack, which re-spun modern pop songs like Tom Jones' "Sex Bomb" and Billy Ocean's "When the Going Gets Tough" as breezy 1920s jazz tunes. Too clever.

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Like the Tin Man from the Wizard of Oz finally getting de-rustified with a little help from Dorothy, Kim and I are determined to blog here again on a regular basis after a brief hiatus called life.

Maybe our kick in the pants was spurned on by recently partaking of afternoon tea at the High Tea Cottage in Woodland Hills. It's an unassuming little house off Ventura Blvd. and while it perhaps suffers from a bit of the teddy-bear-and-doily effect, we were pleasantly surprised by the proprietess's insanely thorough offerings of loose-leaf tea. We thought we'd died and gone to heaven when a rolling cart packed with tea varieties was brought to our table, from which we could smell any variety that piqued our interest before settling on our order. From fruity to chocolate-flavored and with names like Crime of Passion and Bourbon Street Vanilla, it was hard to narrow down our options. Kim chose a marzipan-flavor while I opted for the decisively caramel Mocha Rocca. Both were equally unique and amazing. Getting to smell the teas in their little jars ahead of time was a major plus and made the whole experience feel a bit like wine-tasting or hanging out at a perfume counter sampling the wares. I only wish there'd been time to try more.

After devouring our tea sandwiches, the rolling cart returned. This time we got to choose from several different jams to accompany fresh-from-the-oven apple-cinnamon scones. By the time we finished our assortment of decadent desserts, we were in a sugar coma and thankful that we'd chosen decaf teas. If you live in the L.A. area and enjoy afternoon tea, this place is worth the pilgrimage.

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Excellent interview with director Jane Campion about her stunningly gorgeous new film Bright Star on KCRW's The Treatment.

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Thanks to the incredible staff at Skylight Books I was able to obtain a copy of Wolf Hall a couple weeks ago (hard to get at the time since it had just won the Booker Prize). The tale of Henry VIII's pursuit of Anne Boleyn come hell or high water drives the plot, but it's the ambition and inventiveness of Hilary Mantel's narrator Thomas Cromwell that make the story so compelling. She portrays him as surprisingly enlightened and, for all his power, equally beloved and feared. While I was reading I found myself picturing Jeremy Northam as Cromwell--He actually plays Cromwell's nemesis Sir Thomas More to James Frain's Cromwell in Showtime's The Tudors. --Kim

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Who among us can resist the allure of a (literally) incurable romantic, sighing deep sighs from his deathbed overlooking the Spanish Steps as he coughs up blood and ponders what might have been with his one true love?

It's been an uninspired moviegoing summer here at Romancing the Tome, but things are looking up for Fall, particularly with Jane Campion's forthcoming biopic of the love story between sickly poet John Keats (Ben Whishaw) and his darling Fanny Brawne (Abbie Cornish). Bright Star will premiere October 18. (It was a hit at Cannes this spring, so that's encouraging.)

Check out the trailer and start stocking up on Kleenex:


F.Y.I., if you're in the neighborhood of London, you can check out the newly restored Regency House where Keats lived (and from whence he swooned over Fanny).

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Officer Mike Mercer is a confused young cop with a Colma beat (pop. living: 1,200 pop. dead: 2 million) whose life is spiraling out of control. Then he starts seeing ghosts. Author Doug Dorst keeps the plot zipping along without sacrificing character and there's something here that feels coming of age, in a good way. It's the sort of coming of age familiar to us Gen X and Yers who are forever hovering over the line between childhood and adulthood--just like Colma's ghosts hover between this world and the next.

Alive In Necropolis certainly has what it takes to cross over into film: cops, ghosts, drug overdoses, car crashes, romance, and for a backdrop, the haunting streets of San Francisco. My casting picks: Casey Affleck, James McAvoy, or Joseph Gordon-Levitt as Michael Mercer, Giovanni Ribisi as "Doc" Barker, Ryan Gosling as optimistic aviator Lincoln Beachey, Peter Sarsgaard as Toronto, Jesse Eisenberg as Jude, and Lili Taylor as Fiona. Read it and let us know what you think. --Kim

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Take our quiz and match the phrase with the correct play.

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I began Dan Simmons' Drood in earnest this afternoon after a false start a couple of weeks ago. There's a description of Dickens' era London cemeteries during one particularly stifling summer--you can almost smell the vile stench wafting from the pages. Le Monde diplomatique's article on the history of the Victorian's "see and be seen" cemetery Highgate made a nice companion read for the day. More on Drood to come. --Kim

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Vanity Fair has some great pics of Johnny Depp as the Mad Hatter, Helena Bonham Carter as the Queen of Hearts and Mia Wasikowska as Alice in Tim Burton's highly-anticipated (at least, by us) 3-D version of Lewis Carroll's Alice in Wonderland! I barely recognize Johnny Depp in this picture, but that's probably a good thing...I was worried he'd look exactly like he did when he played Willy Wonka.

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