This decidedly different film is like a series of moving paintings in its depiction of three women from the same family, who all drown their husbands. As a black comedy, this is a great idea by maverick British director Peter Greenaway but, although his images recall the paintings of Brueghel, Greenaway lingers too long in the telling of the tall tale, and gives it too little substance. Not that the whole thing doesn't have a certain bizarre consistency and compulsion. The coroner (Bernard Hill), who fancies all three women (Joan Plowright, Juliet Stevenson and Joely Richardson) and lies about the watery deaths, has a 13-year-old son who numbers deaths, animal or human, throughout the picture, and fires off fireworks for every 'victim'. Like most of Greenaway's works, this is not your average movie, but it's one that sheds much of its initial tedium as it develops. Cinematographer Sacha Vierney's colour compositions should surely have qualified for some kind of award.


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