Review: 'Mr. Malcolm's List' puts pretty people into a pleasant trip through an Austen-like comedy of manners

Because Jane Austen only wrote six novels, and somebody has to feed the insatiable appetite of viewers of early 19th-century comedies of manners, we get movies like “Mr. Malcolm’s List,” a trifle of knee britches and empire-waist dresses enlivened by an engaging and ludicrously good-looking cast.

Miss Julia Thistlewaite (Zawe Ashton) is lovely, charming, and rather witty — though maybe not as smart as she thinks she is. During conversation, when someone refers to septuagenarians, she replies, “Oh, I despise foreigners.” It’s this deficit in cleverness that prompts Mr. Jeremy Malcolm (Sopé Dìrísù), the independently wealthy and most desired young bachelor in London, to pass her over after accompanying her to the opera. This slight gets noticed by the gossips around the city, and Julia feels her reputation is ruined.

Julia learns from her friend, Lord Cassidy (Oliver Jackson-Cohen), that Malcolm keeps a list of the traits he desires in a prospective wife. Julia then concocts a plot, to get her revenge on Malcolm for rejecting her: Julia will set Malcolm up with the perfect partner, and at the right moment, have her give him a list of her ideal qualities in a mate.

The key to Julia’s plot is to find someone to pretend to fall for Malcolm. Julia has a candidate in Selina Dalton (Freida Pinto), her girlhood boarding school friend, who recently has been orphaned in Kent. Julia invites Selina to stay with her in London, and enlists her in her plot, which Selina does reluctantly and out of loyalty to Julia. The wrinkle comes early, when Selina meets Malcolm before realizing who he is — and, from then on, starts falling for him for real, and he with her.

Julia keeps the pressure on Selina to stick to the plan, but Julia finds herself being distracted by Malcolm’s military friend, Capt. Henry Ossory (Theo James). Julia and the Captain have a bickering banter, the sort that anyone familiar with such period romances — or, for that matter, any romantic movies at all — will recognize as cover for feelings of true love.

Ashton (“Velvet Buzzsaw”) is delightful as the petulant Julia, justifying her actions in a steady stream of banter aimed at Cassidy, Selina and, at times, the audience. Pinto, Dìrísù and James are all lovely — but the scene-stealer is Ashley Park (“Emily in Paris,” “Girls5Eva”) as Selina’s bubble-headed acquaintance, giggling through every socially awkward encounter.

Director Emma Holly Jones deploys the multi-ethnic casting that fans of “Bridgerton” will recognize — though it could be said that Jones did it first, since she also directed the 2019 proof-of-concept short that got this movie greenlit, with Pinto, Dìrísù and Jackson-Cohen in the same roles, and Gemma Chan (“Crazy Rich Asians”) as Julia. 

Suzanne Allain, who wrote the screenplay based on her own novel, isn’t reinventing the Regency-era wheel here. The characters go through their paces — check all the boxes, as it were — and end up by and large where the viewer expects them to land. In this case, it’s the journey that’s important, with the script producing wry laughs and few surprises.

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‘Mr.Malcolm’s List’

★★★

Opens Friday, July 1, in theaters everywhere. Rated PG for some smoking and mild language. Running time: 115 minutes.