In promotion of this film, Emma Thompson did an interview with Entertainment Weekly in which she lamented the "vulgar" comedies of the day. I think we know what she is referring to. Films about bodily functions. Scenes of crass nudity. Comedies seemingly targeted at the fraternity crowd. Anything by Seth Rogan."The Love Punch", as she was implying, is the antidote. It's the story of two older exes who reunite for a noble cause--to regain their retirement funds, which were callously liquidated by the young CEO of a predatory French company, Lexon. Emma Thompson plays the ex-wife, Kate Jones. Pierce Brosnan plays the ex-husband, Richard Jones, the owner of a company that was recently purchased by the French company. He is looking forward to his retirement years, until he is blindsided by the tyranny of Lexon.He has to admit to his ex-wife that their retirement funds are gone, threatening their golden years and the college funds of their children. This is the setup that triggers a parody of "Mission Impossible", in which the couple reunites in a scheme to steal a celebrated diamond. They are assisted by their long-married friends, humorously played by Celia Imrie and Timothy Spall.The unlikely foursome are the soul of unsuave and uncool, and that is the source of most of the comedy in this cute film. It's a light-hearted, kind film that offers later-life observations about the concept of length-of-life romance. I also love the soundtrack, which defines the tone of the film with pinpoint precision.This film could appeal to anyone, but those who can relate to Empty Nest Syndrome and the challenges of Retirement are its primary audience.

Asinine comedy showing that Emma Thompson, the actress who signs the anti-Israel petitions in real life and Pierce Brosnan, aren't really adept at comedy at all.The story line deals with an upper class divorced couple who discover that all their assets have literally been taken from them by a young shrewd man who bought the company that her husband works for. All the employees are up the creek, or it appears that way.Naturally, Brosnan and Thompson team up to gain revenge on the man who has just married. They go to France to steal valuable diamonds and come into all sorts of comical situations, many of whom are inane and ridiculous.

Love Punch is a rom com that is neither romantic nor funny.In spite of it's line up of quality British actors the result is a silly farce with no sexual chemistry between the lead actors and literally no funny lines whatsoever.The premise seems to be that it is intrinsically hilarious to watch people in their 60s do things that people in their 30s do better - nope!Such a shame more time and money wasn't spent developing the script to beef up the characters and build their motivations to take the step of attempting a robbery that no one in their right mind would try. One might argue that it's a light hearted film so you just have to accept that the plot is flimsy, but this overlooks the fact that to sympathise with the characters you have to believe them to be justified - call me uncharitable but, whilst it's sad if a privileged divorcée whose kids have grown up and who watches daytime t.v all day, loses her pension and has only her nice house her family and her health and looks to console her, it doesn't really tear me up inside. (perhaps I shouldn't have watched it off the back of 'Twelve Years a Slave')Anyway, to qualify as lighthearted it needs to have jokes and comedy timing, not just a musical montage every five minutes cut to the kind of track you can buy the rights to on a budget.Where's Richard Curtis when you need him?

I do enjoy a good British romantic comedy. My guilty pleasure I guess. They just make you laugh and feel good, just a little escapism and shouldn't be taken seriously. Being serious, well, that's for other films. Having said that, this movie has so many things wrong with it, it should be a huge failure, but oddly enough I loved it. I thought the two leads Pierce Brosnan and Emma Thompson were exceptionally well cast as they were so believable and likable. The other "good guy" Anglo-Saxon characters were good and as in so many other British films, the bad guys were French. I'm not sure how to judge their performances. The French accents were really dodgy at best and totally unbelievable, but this just added to all the fun. You know what? I must just watch this again, now.