It's the off-season at the lonely Beauregard Hotel in Bournemoth, and only the long-term tenants are still in residence. Life is stirred up, however, when the beautiful Ann Shankland arrives to see her alcoholic ex-husband, John Malcolm, who is secretly engaged to Pat Cooper, the woman who runs the hotel. Meanwhile, snobbish Mrs Railton-Bell discovers that the kindly if rather doddering Major Pollock, played by David Niven, who won an Oscar for his performance, a retired officer who likes to find out more...

Superb sets, acting and Swiftian dialogue puts this historical "whodunnit" up among the best films to come out of Britain in years. An English noblewoman employs a haughty artist to sketch 12 drawings of her husband's estate in exchange for sex. The sketches themselves prove of an even greater significance than supposed upon the discovery of the body of Mr. Herbert. find out more...