The Hippopotamus

“A beast of a comedy.”

Ted Wallace (Roger Allam), a poet whose name has gone sour in London, wants one thing: a bed, a drink and a reason to be paid. He gets all three when an old friend summons him to a country manor to look into a run of unexplained miracles. John Jencks sets him among the manor's house guests, and the film's last picture is Ted himself, glass in hand, sizing up whoever he has to talk to next.