The last time my movie and dinner-discussion friends and I saw a film, it was Hamnet, a serious tale based on the death of William Shakespeare’s son.
For our recent outing, we went in the completely opposite direction, because all of us agreed we were in serious need of a good laugh.
The Sheep Detective fit the bill.
The plot revolves around a flock of sheep who banded together to solve the mystery of who had killed their shepherd. This may have seemed thin, but after we absorbed a solid half hour of PG summer movie previews, our blood pressures had ticked down to the correct range for enjoying what we were about to watch.
That none of us figured out “whodunnit” before the sheep led the English village’s befuddled human officer to come to the correct conclusion? The icing on the cake.
Never-you-mind that a New Yorker Magazine columnist in May eviscerated this film, a review which I fortunately read after seeing it personally.
We friends of three generations hooted and smiled and gasped throughout the film, and enjoyed wide-ranging conversation thereafter!
I must admit that I may have enjoyed this film more than many because my father-in-law, a psychiatrist, also fancied himself an English country gentleman-farmer. The farm menagerie included not only a variety of ducks, pairs of swans and peacocks, multiple dogs and cats, but also a robust flock of sheep.
Dolly, the lead sheep, wore a bell so we would know where the flock chose to graze during the day. Like clockwork, they returned to the barn every night for their feed, just as in the movie, Lily and her flock returned to their shepherd for their bedtime story.
My husband grew up with an orphaned pet lamb named Timmy, who was not only bottle-fed in the house, but rode around in the family car.
This kind of life may seem eccentric.
But a trip to green acres soothes the soul. ©
