‘Good Luck to You, Leo Grande’ Film Review: Emma Thompson Shines as a Widow Seeking a Little Physical Companionship

Elizabeth Hurley pulled out all the stops on Thursday night as she headed out to London to help dear friend Joan Collins celebrate her 88th birthday and her 20th wedding anniversary.MORE: Elizabeth Hurley is summer ready as she poses in her own brand bikiniThe actress was accompanied by a very dapper plus one, her 19-year-old son Damian, who let mum Elizabeth hold on to his arms as they exited the party, which was held at Claridge's Hotel.WATCH: Elizabeth Hurley looks sensational in yellow bikini as she dances to Spice GirlsFor the special celebration, which was also attended by Simon Cowell and Lauren Silverman and Sarah Ferguson, Elizabeth donned a plunging red gown with gorgeous back detailing.READ: Elizabeth Hurley's sizzling bikini photos send famous friends wild with envyRELATED: Elizabeth Hurley's rocks short blonde hair in show-stopping photoThe 56-year-old completed her look with a silver sparkling clutch bag, a matching diamond bracelet and silver drop earrings. Elizabeth with her son Damian Hurley attended Joan Collins' party at Claridge'sTo finish off her glamorous look, Elizabeth wore her hair straight and her usual smokey eyes and glossy lips.

Gogglebox is finally returning to our screens this evening which means the nation's best-loved siblings are back on TV.

An Ayrshire charity is counting the cost after a devastating break in at one of their much-loved shops.

Borussia Dortmund tried to get their famous Yellow Wall shaking by cranking up Van Halen tune Jump.

Kanye West has revealed that the only way to listen to his forthcoming album ‘Donda 2’ will be via his own Stem Player, a device that was first released in conjunction with ‘Donda’ last year that allowed users to remix the album’s songs using stems of vocals, drums, bass, samples and more.In an Instagram post shared today (February 18), West shared footage of an unreleased song playing off the device. In the caption, the rapper said that ‘Donda 2’ would be available exclusively through the platform, saying it would not appear on Apple, Amazon, Spotify or YouTube.“Today artists get just 12% of the money the industry makes.

Spotify may have paid at least $200million for the exclusive rights to Joe Rogan’s podcast, double the figure that was previously reported.The streaming giant secured an exclusive license to host The Joe Rogan Experience in May 2020, when it was widely reported the controversial podcast host had been paid over $100million as part of the deal.However, “two people familiar with the details of the transaction” have since claimed to The New York Times that the three-and-a-half-year deal was actually worth twice what was initially believed: at least $200million. Spotify has yet to publicly comment on this report.The Times points out Spotify had previously purchased whole content companies – podcast network Gimlet Media and digital media brand The Ringer – both for slightly less than $200million each.In recent weeks, Spotify has come under fire for hosting The Joe Rogan Experience, its biggest podcast in the US and many other countries, with an estimated per-episode listenership of around 11million people.Last month, Neil Young requested the platform pull his catalogue, citing “false information about vaccines” being spread on the platform and specifically targeting Rogan’s podcast.

Derek McInnes insists he wants his players to thrive under the pressure of trying to lead Kilmarnock straight back to the Premiership.

Ange Postecoglou admits Celtic lacked clinical edge and composure as they were bashed by Bodo/Glimt.

David Jamieson is set for the biggest night of his career as he tackles Swedish champion Samo Jangirov at Trump Turnberry on Friday.

Larkhall teenager Cody Houston is looking to forge a career in boxing after winning his first tournament gold medal.

Airdrie boss Ian Murray hopes the club’s Celtic connections can help them land the League One title.

Phoebe Dynevor has an exciting new movie in the works!

Delilah Belle Hamlin is celebrating a major milestone.

Dion Charles admits he has not found the transition to life at Bolton Wanderers tough following his hugely successful start to life at his new club as he spoke on how his non-league background has helped to shape his career.

The deals keep coming at the 2022 Virtual Sundance Film Festival. MUBI closed the docu Free Chol Soo Lee, including North America, and Warner Bros is negotiating a near $7 million WW rights deal for the Tig Notaro/Stephanie Allynne film Am I Ok? to place the film on HBO Max. The Lauren Pomerantz-scripted film stars Dakota Johnson, Sonoya Mizuno, Jermaine Fowler, Molly Gordon, June Diane Raphael, and Sean Hayes.

The Sundance Film Festival is revealing award winners for its 2022 edition on Friday afternoon beginning at 2 p.m. PT. Like the rest of this year’s festival, which was forced to go all-virtual because of the recent Omicron surge, the awards ceremony is playing out on Twitter.

said upon introducing the awards ceremony. “This year’s festival expressed a powerful convergence; we were present, together, as a community connected through the work. And it is work that has already changed those who experienced it,” festival director Tabitha Jackson added.

Kevin Macdonald (The Mauritanian, Whitney) has been set to helm The Iceman, which will star Joseph Fiennes (The Handmaid’s Tale) as the larger-than-life extreme athlete Wim Hof.

Apple has closed the biggest deal of the 2022 Virtual Sundance Film Festival, securing worldwide rights to the Cooper Raiff-directed Cha Cha Real Smooth for around $15 million. The streamer has been the front runner for the picture since it premiered January 23 in the US Dramatic Competition category.

EXCLUSIVE: Searchlight Pictures has closed a deal around $7.5 million for U.S. rights to Good Luck To You, Leo Grande. the Sophie Hyde-directed film that stars Emma Thompson and Daryl McCormack (The Wheel of Time & Peaky Blinders). Deadline reported yesterday  that Searchlight was poised to win the film that was bid on by several distributors, and the plan is to wage an awards season campaign for Thompson in a standout turn. Searchlight will release through Hulu, in a deal similar to the preemptive one it made for another Sundance film, Fresh. Hyde directed 52 Tuesdays and Animals. The film is scripted by Katy Brand, whose credits include Nanny McPhee Returns, which starred Thompson, and Walking On Sunshine.

EXCLUSIVE: Searchlight Pictures has emerged as the favorite to acquire Good Luck To You, Leo Grande, the Sophie Hyde-directed drama that stars Emma Thompson as a widow who decides to seek out something that has eluded her over a 31-year marriage: a proper, mind-blowing, toe-curling orgasm. Negotiations are underway and will hopefully climax into the first narrative film deal at 2022 Sundance, after a weekend of foreplay but no consummation beyond the docu Fire of Love.

$25 million Apple paid for “CODA,” the $15 million Netflix paid for “Passing” or documentary-record $15 million Searchlight/Hulu paid for “Summer of Soul.”  There’s still plenty of time for dealmaking, but not much time for new films to grab the spotlight: All of the festival’s movies were programmed to launch in the first five days, with Monday’s lineup – which included “Emily the Criminal,” “The American Dream and Other Fairy Tales,” “Dos Estaciones,” “The Janes” and “Am I OK?” – scheduled as the last of this year’s premieres.

Stripping down in her sixties. Emma Thompson got real about embracing nude scenes for her new movie, Good Luck to You, Leo Grande. 

“I’ve always been a card-carrying, kind of militant feminist about women’s bodies and what’s been done to them, what we’re told is expected of ourselves, what we’re told to do to ourselves,” Thompson said at TheWrap’s virtual Sundance studio. “I think one of the rare triumphs of this story and of this movie is that it presents the untreated body for one of those very rare moments.”The film, which premiered at this year’s Sundance Film Festival, stars Thompson as Nancy Stokes, a retired widow whose passionless marriage has come to an end and who now wants to explore the sort of intimacy that had been denied to her for decades.

Emma Thompson is opening up about going nude in her new movie.

Even in its truncated virtual Covid-afflicted form last year, the Sundance Film Festival was remarkably able to debut several movies that a year later we are still talking about in the Oscar conversation including CODA, Jockey, Passing, Flee, and Mass. Maybe this success was due to the fact they all had one word titles, but more realistically it was because despite all the drawbacks, the fest honchos picked very well and now awards voters are enjoying the riches.  As I have been seeing one film after another in this year’s (virtual) fest I find myself looking for that breakout movie or performance which with the right distribution we will be talking about still a year from now. There have been some promising performances so far from the likes of Julianne Moore, Bill Nighy and a couple still to come later, but the wow factor really hit me in seeing Emma Thompson in the British film Good Luck To You, Leo Grande, premiering today at Sundance, where to put it mildly, she knocks it out of the park. This is Thompson at her best, a witty, dazzling. and above all brave performance that will undoubtedly be talked about. Her co-star Daryl McCormack  in this two-hander is equally good in the movie which centers on a 60ish widowed mother of two and religious studies teacher who hires a sex worker for a tryst in a hotel room. It is much more complicated than that, in this story of two disparate souls who come together, one full of anxiety and past regrets, the other professional to his core but with a guard he will not let down and a line he will not cross.

Amy Nicholson In the opening sequence of Sophie Hyde’s riveting “Good Luck to You, Leo Grande,” a suave young man (Daryl McCormack) steps out of an ice cream parlor, catches a mint candy in his mouth, and swings around a street pole like a hipster Gene Kelly. The Irishman is confidently cool — and not quite himself. He’s getting into character as Leo Grande, a charming sex worker who sells the Leo Grande Fantasy: a “service,” he calls it, where he gives paying customers exactly what they need, be it physical release, conversation or, for one client, dressing like a cat.

Jenelle Riley Deputy Awards, Features EditorOn the surface, a film set primarily in one hotel room with a pair of actors might seem simple. But in the case of “Good Luck to You, Leo Grande,” which premieres Jan. 22 at the Sundance Film Festival, limiting the location gave the film an opportunity to explore what star Emma Thompson calls “the emotional landscape.”Thompson plays Nancy, a widow and former teacher who has stepped outside her comfort zone for the first time in her life and hired a sex worker, the titular Leo Grande, played by “Peaky Blinders” actor Daryl McCormack.