Eric Styles made a distinctive debut with his first film, Dreaming of Joseph Lees, a gloomy, Hardyesque tragedy. Now he has exhumed Noël Coward's Relative Values, a brittle comedy which is not of the Master's first rank. In attempting to dissolve its theatrical boundaries, the adaptation smudges the clarity and unity of the stage settings and in any case ends up becalmed in the various rooms of "Marshwood Hall".

There is much tinkling laughter and people in black tie saying lines like: "Everything is quite, quite ghastly!" Julie Andrews is a regal presence as the Countess of Marshwood - though her hair and deportment suggest modern California rather than pinched, 50s Britain. She resents her son's engagement to Miranda (Jeanne Tripplehorn), an American movie star being pursued by another Yank, Billy Baldwin.

It's the kind of accomplished cast that would pack them in at, say, London's Theatre Royal, Haymarket. But on the screen everything looks too creaky - including the reactionary view that Brits and Americans should know their respective stations in life. That said, there is a droll turn from Stephen Fry as the butler and an outstandingly funny, sympathetic performance from Sophie Thompson as Moxie the maid.