Saving Grace (2000 film)

Soon after the funeral of her husband, Cornish housewife Grace Trevethyn discovers that she has been left with his massive debts. Unless she can raise a large amount of money, she will lose both her home and all of her possessions. Her loyal gardener Matthew offers to continue working without pay if she were to care for his dying pot plants. Grace agrees and when the plants flourish under her care, Matthew suggests that they grow and sell pot illegally. With no other options and a creditor calling her home, Grace agrees. Matthew's girlfriend Nicky disapproves of the plan, particularly as she has recently learned from the town doctor and friend Martin Bamford that she is pregnant. While the plants are growing Grace meets her dead husband's mistress, Honey, but sends her away after realizing that her husband was more sexually active with Honey than with her.

Grace eventually learns that Nicky is pregnant and decides to seek out a buyer on her own. When this proves to be more difficult than she expected, Grace has Honey introduce her to a drug dealer, Vince, only for him to lack the capital to purchase such a large crop. He introduces her to French businessman Jacques Chevalier, who Grace manages to impress with her knowledge of fly fishing and French. After initial disruptions, Chevalier and Grace negotiate a deal for the marijuana, and Grace, Vince, and Dr Bamford (who, with Matthew, had followed Grace to London) head back home; Chevalier secretly instructs his bodyguard to take Vince and follow them to Grace's home.

Once home, Grace discovers that the Women's Institute is preparing to hold a luncheon in her garden, and that the creditors are coming to remove her furniture and possessions. Matthew reconciles with Nicky and to his joy, learns that she's pregnant. Together the two stall Vince and the bodyguard by telling the local Police Sergeant Alfred Mabely that they are poachers. Meanwhile some of the Women's Institute members consume pot in liquid format, thinking that it was actually tea. As Grace and her friends try to dismantle the grow operation, chaos breaks loose as the police (called by Mabely on the purported poachers), Jacques's people, and the creditors all arrive at the house. Grace chooses to burn the pot so no one can have it. Unable to resist, Martin opens the doors to the greenhouse and sends out a cloud of pot smoke that envelops the crowd. Meanwhile in her home, Grace has discovered Jacques, who tells her that he only wanted his bodyguard to protect her, as he has fallen for her.

Several months later the town's residents gather in the pub to watch a television special about Grace's seemingly overnight transition from an unknown widow to a millionaire after the success of her novel Joint Venture. The special also covers Grace's marriage to Chevalier, as well as the large riot at her house in which "nobody could remember anything."

Top to bottom: Brenda Blethyn and Craig Ferguson star in the film as Grace Trevethyn and her gardener Matthew Stewart, respectively.

• Brenda Blethyn as Grace Trevethyn, a newly widowed middle-aged woman who is faced with the prospect of financial ruin and turns to growing marijuana under the tutelage of her gardener in order to save her family home. Blethyn, who was Ferguson's first choice, signed on the movie two years before shooting.[4]
• Craig Ferguson as Matthew Stewart, Grace's gardener. Ferguson created the playful character with himself in mind. "I saw him as a decent chap who happens to like a bit of marijuana," Ferguson said. "He really cares about Grace and he wants to save her."[5]
• Martin Clunes as Dr. Martin Bamford, a friend of Matthew. Clunes' character was spun off into a pair of films focusing on how he ended up in Cornwall. Later the character was renamed Dr. Martin Ellingham and underwent a complete personality change to become the sullen misanthrope that stars in the ITV television series Doc Martin, which states in its ending credits that the character was derived from the film Saving Grace.
• Valerie Edmond as Nicky, Matthew's frowning girlfriend. Edmond won the role of the village's fishing captain in a large open casting call.[5]
• Tcheky Karyo as Jacques Chevalier
• Jamie Foreman as China MacFarlane
• Bill Bailey as Vince
• Diana Quick as Honey Chambers
• Tristan Sturrock as Harvey
• Phyllida Law as Margaret Sutton
• Linda Kerr Scott as Diana Skinner
• Leslie Phillips as Rev. Gerald Percy
• Paul Brooke as Charlie
• Ken Campbell as Sgt. Alfred Mabely
• Clive Merrison as Quentin Rhodes

According to Blethyn, Saving Grace was conceived after screenwriter Mark Crowdy had been "talking to somebody in Los Angeles and somebody mentioned apropos of nothing that really good marijuana was more valuable than gold, and he thought, oh, maybe that would make an interesting story."[6] Born and grown up in Cornwall, he was inspired to create a story that was set in the South West England county.[6] Crowdy, who penned the script along with Craig Ferguson, approached Blethyn several years into writing.[6]

After Saving Grace, two television film prequels to the film were made by BSkyB: Doc Martin and Doc Martin and the Legend of the Cloutie, in which viewers learn that Bamford, a successful obstetrician (played by Martin Clunes in each), finds that his wife has been carrying on extramarital affairs behind his back with his three best friends. After confronting her with the news, he decides to leave London and heads for Cornwall, which he remembers fondly from his youth. Shortly after he arrives, he gets involved in the mystery of the "Jellymaker" and, following the departure of the village's resident GP, decides to stay in Port Isaac and fill the gap himself.

Clunes' company tried selling a series on the same theme to ITV who liked it, but felt the character of Martin Bamford needed a stronger defining characteristic than just being a "townie" who is a little out of his depth in the country. ITV wanted the character to be more challenging, so the idea of the doctor being unusually ill-tempered was touted. Out of that idea a new series, also called Doc Martin, was born. Doc Martin was created for ITV in 2004 by Dominic Minghella; in the ITV series, the main character's surname was changed from Bamford to Ellingham, a deliberate anagram of the Minghella family name. The series became a huge success in the UK and internationally; the end titles state that the Doc Martin series' existence was "Arising from the Film Saving Grace Created by Craig Ferguson & Mark Crowdy".

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