More To 'lady' Than Meets The Eye Or Nose

Smith stars as a cantankerous, seemingly unhinged old woman who lives in squalor inside a van that she has parked in an upwardly mobile middle-class neighborhood of London. Ursula (Frances de la Tour), the widow of composer Ralph Vaughan Williams, resides in the area, as does playwright Bennett (Alex Jennings), who lives to regret extending a helping hand to the ornery and malodorous woman who calls herself Mary Shepherd. Most of the time, she's disagreeable and eccentric as she moves her battered home from parking spot to parking spot in the neighborhood. Bennett wishes he could be as indifferent to Mary as his snobby neighbors Rufus and Pauline (Roger Allam and Deborah Findlay), but Mary has a way of ignoring whatever impediment is thrown her way, and she's decided Bennett will be her benefactor. Though "The Lady in the Van" is one of those quaint and quirky little films of which the British are inordinately fond, Americans will find it equally endearing, with the exception of the hideously over-the-top final scene.