Well I nearly fell of my 4x4. This film version of the stage play Uncle Vanya was rather good.

It starts off slowly and like a lot of Chekhov plays, there are people talking about their existence in rural Russia.

It heats up when Professor Serebryakov (Roger Allam) decides he wants to sell the estate even though it actually belongs to his daughter from his first marriage.

This incident causes Vanya (Toby Jones) to explode with rage.

Allam makes Serebryakov an aloof selfish know it all. I wonder if he realised how close he was to lose his much younger second wife Yelena (Rosalind Eleazar) to the visiting Doctor Astrov (Richard Armitage.)

Good performances from Aimee Lou Wood. She plays young Sonya who with Uncle Vanya toils the estate so her father can have good standard of living in the city. She also has the hots for Dotoe Astrov but he prefers Sonya's stepmother.

Toby Jones comes to his own when he rages about his existence and what could had been in the later acts. With a brother in law like Professor Serebryakov. No wonder Vanya wanted to end it all.

This film start with an old woman "Nana" kissing the photo frame, and she talking with a doctor "Astrov" scene! As turnout, this film is about a series of family drama surrounding Uncle Vanya! Entire film full of boring conversation, and annoying overuse scene! Such as, overuse of the arguing scene, overuse of the calling names scene, overuse of the blackout scene, overuse of the playing music instrument scene, overuse of the sewing scene, overuse of the talking to the audience scene, overuse of the walking scene, overuse of the drinking scene, overuse of the kissing scene, overuse of the singing scene, overuse of the eating scene, and overuse of the closing door scene! Make the film unwatchable! Barely laughable scene is, Vanya miscounted the years! At the end, Serebrayakov, Yelena, and Astrov leaving Uncle Vanya! That's it! Wasting time to watch!

You have to work at it to screw Checkhov and though Conor McPherson does his best the actors remain loyal to Checkhov and the David Mamet adaptation coupled with Louis Malle's direction is still the movie version to beat. Although the smart money says The Cherry Orchard is Checkov's piece de resistance I have always had a soft spot for Vanya and this new version weighing in at two and a half hours does nothing to make me change my mind. Filming live performances in a theatre has come a long way since Richard Burton's Hamlet and this is a triumph of the genre.