LADY BRENTLY'S END | Omeleto Comedy

A woman tries to convince her sister to live.


Louise has just heard some terrible news: her husband, Lord Brently, has been killed in a carriage accident. With his death, she also fears for her loss of financial security and social status, since having a husband is the only way a woman can secure her future in Victorian-era England.

But her sister Josephine offers comfort to her distraught sister. Josephine is more liberated than Louise and attempts to convince her more old-fashioned sister that perhaps there is hope in a future where she can shape her destiny and not be confined to increasingly archaic rules. Louise is skeptical and nervous, but she begins to see that Josephine just might have a point.

Directed by Sam Baron from a script written by Kirsty Mann (who also stars as the free-thinking Josephine) and Dipak Patel, this smartly entertaining short is a drawing-room comedy whose historical costumes, elegant yet flinty dialogue and perceptive portrayal of the intersection of social mores and emotional life evoke the beloved works of Jane Austen and the Bronte sisters. But there's an undercurrent of modern sensibility that creeps in, also making it a keenly satirical comment about how past and present are not as far apart as you'd think.

Looking very much like a polished costume drama, the film doubles down at the beginning on its resplendent set and costumes, its lovely classically-inspired musical score and a stately sense of visuals, right down to the clear, slightly melancholic lighting. It matches the emotional devastation when Louise hears the news of her husband's terrible accident.

But as Josephine begins comforting her sister, we quickly realize the peppery, acerbic dialogue has more up its sleeve, starting with the insight that Louise's distress is less from losing Lord Brently than it is from the possibility of being husbandless. Each of Louise's worries about being unmarried is ridiculous ("What if it rains? How will I cross puddles?") answered by an equally ridiculously serious answer. As actors, Mann and Maddie Rice bring the sisters to life with aplomb, hitting both the arch comedic notes and injecting just enough knowing irony to make it smart and convincing, especially as Louise sees the possibilities of independence.

What's clever and delightfully complex in LADY BRENTLY'S END is how modern ideas, references and assumptions begin to creep in, which allows the writing to gently poke fun at the idea that Louise as a woman can "do anything." The "anything" that excites Louise lampoons how shallow achievements or dubious milestones extolled in pop culture and public discussion often overshadow the ways that women's freedoms have fallen short in substance. But there's no going back now, for both the world and Louise -- for better or for worse, as in Louise's case.


LADY BRENTLY'S END. Courtesy of Kirsty Mann at https://sambaron.com.