Presented in partnership with Tenants’ Union (ACT) in celebration of International Tenants’ Day 2018

The Bookshop is an adaptation of Penelope Fitzgerald’s 1978 novel, and Spanish filmmaker Isabel Coixet’s latest film about existential conflicts after Elegy and The Secret Life of Words.

Winning two Goya awards in 2018 – including Best Film and Best Director –the film tells the story of Florence Green (Mortimer), a melancholy widow who moves to the small coastal town of Suffolk in the 1950s. There, she purchases an abandoned house with the intention of opening the town’s first bookshop. Although initial reception to Florence’s idea by her new seaside neighbours is frigid, she braves it all and opens her doors for business.

Florence soon finds her efforts met with both passive-aggressive silence and gossip, alongside cloaked resistance from the influential and wealthy Mrs Gamart (Clarkson). Before long, it seems the only positive relationship Florence is able to maintain is with Edmund Brundish (Nighy), the town’s hermit. Amidst discomfiture and small town whispers, The Bookshop is ultimately a thoughtful and enchanting testament to the power of the written word that will leave you with goosebumps.