Hussy

A love story requiring wads of tissue - if not for dabbing at the eyes, then for stuffing in the mouth to stifle frequent yawns - Hussy follows the path of true love as it never runs smooth for a whore with a heart of mould (Mirren) and the lighting man at the nightclub she operates. Set against the sex, drugs and chicken-in-the-basket ambience of London's niteries, their attempts to find happiness (like the scriptwriter's efforts to avoid clichés) get bogged down in a welter of increasingly banal plot devices. A violence-crazed ex-lover, a coke-crazed ex-friend, and a football-crazed 10-year-old son do all they can to mess things up, but like Mirren's virulent essays at acting, it's never quite enough.