Curator Watchlist
A breezy, offbeat British comedy with a warm lead performance and a delightfully absurd premise. It’s more charming than sharp, but the small-town eccentricities and low-stakes criminality make it an easy recommendation for viewers who like gentle capers.
Where to watch: Buy
Mon · 1h 33m
Director: Nigel Cole
Starring: Brenda Blethyn, Craig Ferguson, Martin Clunes
Unexpectedly widowed, prim and proper housewife Grace Trevethyn finds herself in dire financial straits when she inherits massive debts her late husband had been accruing for years. Faced with losing her house, she decides to use her talent for horticulture and hatches a plan to grow potent marijuana which can be sold at an astronomical price, thus solving her financial crisis.
Nigel Cole
Brenda Blethyn, Craig Ferguson, Martin Clunes
A breezy, offbeat British comedy with a warm lead performance and a delightfully absurd premise. It’s more charming than sharp, but the small-town eccentricities and low-stakes criminality make it an easy recommendation for viewers who like gentle capers.
Saving Grace is the kind of movie that turns desperation into a very polite act of rebellion. Brenda Blethyn gives the film its center of gravity, playing Grace as prim, practical, and increasingly game for the absurdity around her. The setup is outrageous, but the movie keeps its tone light and human, treating its heroine’s criminal enterprise as a last-resort act of survival rather than a glamorized scheme.
What makes it work is the combination of gentle comedy and local texture. The Cornish setting, the oddball townspeople, and the increasingly chaotic logistics of growing marijuana all give the film a cozy, eccentric rhythm. It’s not especially sharp or surprising, but it has enough warmth and personality to stay engaging.
If you like British crowd-pleasers that find humor in community, improvised schemes, and stubborn resilience, this is an easy watch. It’s a little slow to get going, but once Grace commits to the plan, the film settles into an amiable groove and lands on a satisfying note.
G_MOVIES (2.5★) · 57 likes
Finally a weed movie for your parents.
theironcupcake (4★) · 45 likes
February 20 marks Brenda Blethyn's 75th birthday, so to celebrate this superb actress I returned to one of the sweetest hidden gems in her filmography, Saving Grace. It's a gentle comedy about an English widow, Grace Trevethyn (Blethyn), who finds out shortly after her husband's funeral that he spent all of their money on failed business ventures and left her with a massive mortgage. On the verge of foreclosure, Grace finds herself entering an unexpected partnership with her gardener, Matthew
📀 Cammmalot 📀 (3.5★) · 39 likes
”Kinda warms the heart, Grace carrying on the local tradition of complete and utter contempt for the law.” Simply charming. A whimsical example of the whole quirky communities from around the world trend that was so popular in this era. Co-written by Craig Ferguson, it’s a fun story, with fun characters, and a terrifically fun soundtrack. It starts off a bit slow, but the last half picks up speed and the whole thing ends on a nice high. BONUS POINTS… more
mattsdad (3★) · 38 likes
Before Walter White there was Grace Trevethyn.
anniefisher987 (3★) · 29 likes
not one part of me understands why they burnt all that weed
A warm British crowd-pleaser about older women taking bold, unconventional action to solve a practical problem.
Shares the same underdog, community-driven comedy energy and working-class resourcefulness.
A small-town scheme comedy with a similar fondness for eccentric locals and cheerful lawbreaking.
Another British ensemble piece about people improvising through hardship with humor and heart.
For viewers who respond to a gentle, character-led story built around a strong older female lead.
A British comic caper about ordinary people bending the rules for survival and comfort.
Shares the same affectionate view of a quirky community and the pleasures of regional specificity.
A mischievous British comedy about cheerful rule-breaking and institutional chaos.
Another witty, mature-led British comedy about reinvention, pragmatism, and social impropriety.
A classic caper with the same dry British wit and ordinary people pulled into crime.
For its ensemble charm, working-class humor, and feel-good momentum.
A character-driven British comedy anchored by a memorable older woman and a strong sense of place.
widowhood, financial desperation, small-town eccentricity, female-led crime, unlikely entrepreneurship, community, suburban/rural life, moral compromise
British comedy, crime caper, feel-good, quirky ensemble, small-town, female protagonist, lightly subversive, early 2000s, cozy tone, marijuana