The Dresser

It is deliciously funny and moving. It is also profoundly about why people perform and create art. And it is heartbreakingly accurate about actors and the theatre.

It's delightful and winning, both sad and funny and touching on so many levels. Welcome this little gem into your arms if you can.

It is, it really is, just as magnificent, powerful and enthralling as you would imagine. Yet to assume the greatness of The Dresser based on the simply sum of its parts is to miss the whole point of the story.

Of course, it's a showcase of great acting, as you would expect, but The Dresser is also a well-tailored play enriched by layers of metaphor and irony.

The Dresser rises and falls on the strength of its central duo, and it's hard to imagine two currently working actors who could rival Courtenay and Finney as well as McKellen and Hopkins do.

Seeing these actors together is wonderful. If there is an edge, it goes to Mr. McKellen, whose scurrying, effeminate Norman is a study in subordination and repressed emotion.

While The Dresser may have ups and downs in its narrative, there's no denying that Sir Anthony Hopkins and Sir Ian McKellen deliver stunning performances that alone make the film worth seeing.

Thoughtful and thrilling in spite of its modest external appearances, The Dresser finds two of our finest thespians at the peak of their powers.

The crisp bite of Harwood's lines (goosed here and there by snippets of Shakespeare) and the vigorous enthusiasm of Hopkins and McKellen give The Dresser an engaging passion.

It's easy to understand why an actor of a certain age would rush to sign on for The Dresser.

When a production features Ian McKellen, Anthony Hopkins, Emily Watson, and Sarah Lancashire from Happy Valley, great expectations are quite in order. I was not disappointed.

While the visual presentation of "The Dresser" may be somewhat lacking in sparks, it more than makes up for that with the undeniably fiery and entertaining turns from both Hopkins and McKellen.