Hysteria – review

It's on with the whiskers and silly hats for a predictable dose of costumed Brit-flick sniggering. Our benighted Victorian forebears believe that "hysteria" (broadly defined)afflicts half of London's women. The treatment is genital massage to orgasm. Sadly, this gives the doctors masturbator's elbow, so an eccentric inventor creates the vibrator – clearing the path to enduring female bliss. What larks! A Dr Finlay type (Hugh Dancy), torn between a feisty suffragette (Maggie Gyllenhaal) and her submissive sister (Felicity Jones), becomes an impassioned feminist. Meanwhile, an array of stereotypical matrons undergo the saucy therapy with appropriate yelps of delight. It all rolls along, and if you like this sort of thing, you'll like it. Production design is a cut above par for this kind of course. Gyllenhaal rises above the tedium; sadly, not far enough. Great English accent, though.