FILM: Wicked Little Letters

In 1920 in the quaint English seaside town of Littlehampton, a curious scandal erupted when scores of townspeople started receiving nasty handwritten letters full of profanity to make the Edwardian mind explode. Based on this strange-but-true story, Wicked Little Letters is a wicked little delight, thanks to memorable performances from Olivia Coleman as prim spinster Edith Swan living with her parents and Jessie Buckley as foul-mouthed Irish immigrant Rose Gooding living in the adjacent row house. A small constellation of other great characters and actors add color to the story as well. Rose is framed, but by whom and why? We find out halfway through, but the real question is whether the perpetrator can be caught, or whether the powers that be prefer a tidy solution even if it’s not true. Littlehampton’s first woman police officer Gladys Moss (Anjana Vasan) is on the case, but a lot of social structure and expectations stand in the way. A little social commentary is smuggled in, but under cover of an engaging procedural with a hefty dose of dark comedy. We loved it.