ChickLit

It’s been more than five years since ‘Fifty Shades of Grey’ hit bookshelves. So you were probably thinking that the window of opportunity to make an endearing British comedy sending up the ‘mummy porn’ phenomenon had passed.

And you’d be absolutely right, which is part of the reason why ‘ChickLit’, a film about four plummy pub mates who hatch a plan to save their beloved boozer by collaborating on a piece of bonkbuster literature, doesn’t really work. It’ll make you cringe in the same way that your dad would if he started talking about Pokémon GO over Christmas lunch in 2021. You might forgive ‘ChickLit’ for being late to the party if the jokes were clever, original or well-delivered.

Instead, the script relies far too heavily on the novelty of poshos blustering their way through BDSM terminology. And just as watching Hugh Grant reading the Ann Summers catalogue out loud would probably be amusing, but only for the first five minutes, it’s not enough to carry an entire film. All told, this ropey comedy will leave you begging for mercy – and not in a kinky way.