Vina and Atul just got married.  Vina is moving in with Atul’s family and they’re excited to start their life together.  They’re able to laugh off interruptions to their wedding night, but after their honeymoon is cancelled it proves difficult to get things off the ground.

In this gentle and affectionate comedy, the young couple’s marriage, although at the heart of the story, is the gateway to the film’s true theme of the relationship between Atul and his father (skilfully played by Harish Patel).

Ayub Khan-Din, writer of East is East, introduces a favourite theme to All In Good Time – the tension between the expectations of immigrant parents for their British-born offspring, the claustrophobia of parental love and expectations, and their children’s desire for adulthood and separation.

Atul’s inability to consummate his marriage becomes entangled with his inability to distinguish himself as a man in the eyes of his exuberant but critical father, and it’s only by resolving the generational conflict that Atul can become the husband he needs to be.

The characters of the lovers in All In Good Time are a bit underwritten, which is unfortunate.  Amara Karan is charming and utterly believable as Vina, although her co-star, newcomer Reece Ritchie, is a little wooden. There are some good comic moments, but also some laboured gags and two-dimensional characters.

All in Good Time is a sweet romantic comedy, with a lot of heart, that is not afraid to tackle serious issues.  A warm diversion in bleak times.

In cinemas now.

- Julia Hilliard