"Lawless Heart" is a smart, funny drama, a perfect 96 minute diversion that will engross you in the joys and heartbreaks of the residents of a small English seaside town.

Neil Hunter and Tom Hunsinger's film starts at a funeral reception. All the major players are there, and from the start, it is a puzzle to determine how all the characters are related to one other. You start with Dan (Bill Nighy) the husband of the sister Judy (Ellie Haddington) of the deceased Stuart (David Coffee). He gets involved with a beguiling French woman Corrine (Clementine Celarie) who turns out to be the local florist, and the story sets out from there.

The film tells three stories, in fact, all jumping off from the funeral. Bill, a happily married man, considers infidelity for the first time. The bereaved lover of Stuart, Nick (Tom Hollander) offers a spare room to the long lost cousin Tim (Douglas Henshall), and finds his quiet life and pretty home disrupted. More surprising still, Nick finds himself falling for a woman (Sukie Smith)--an unrefined grocery checkout girl, no less. In the final episode, the impossible cousin Tim, turns out to be a good guy after all; he has the misfortune of falling in love with a woman (Josephine Butler) who happens to be getting over his best friend Darren (Dominic Hall). The differences in perspective keep the audience an active participant, following the intricate twists and turns of plot, including the path of a particularly fine corkscrew that travels through many hands.

The performances of the ensemble cast are so quietly nuanced and affecting that no one appears to be acting. These are flawed, funny, struggling people you grow to worry and care for. "Lawless Heart" is not a film that will stay in your head or shake your consciousness in any lasting way, but the time spent with Bill and Nick and Tim is spent gladly.