Dead Clever: The Life and Crimes of Julie Bottomley (2007) Online

Ian, caught cheating on Julie with her sister, wakes up covered in blood, not remembering a thing. Soon everybody, including him, realizes he murdered Julie. Only he did not... We had so much fun watching this film I didn't even finish watching the credits and started typing this. You will love this: fun twists in the plot, VERY nice acting of Helen Baxendale (thank you IMDb for telling me I knew her from "Friends" as Emily...) and Suranne Jones whom you can see changing from career woman to insecure girl to totally freaky and scary criminal. So it is all there: laughs, suspense and clever writing. It is acted so good you start believing it could happen, even if it is a totally out-of-control ending. Do yourself a favour and watch it!

This play was cleverly crafted and brilliantly acted. Unfortunately I felt the writer ran out of 'dead clever' ideas towards the end. The decision to introduce a spectacular gun scene was 'dead un-clever', and did not fit the menacing style of the overall drama. The endless stream of guns suddenly surfacing at the actors' fingertips was absurd and far fetched. Following this the final scenes pulled the drama back on line in that they were suitably 'clever' and in keeping with the story, but they did not redeem the silliness of the previous shoot-out. The standard of acting, set and costume design were all first class. The script was very well written and the story was excellent except for that one scene. More drama of this type please.

This was a great drama in which both the writing and the acting was fantastic. The story was a little over the top but it was meant to be, it's a black comedy similar to ITV's earlier outstanding drama 'At Home With The Braithwaites'. The scenes between Helen Baxendale and Suranne Jones were undoubtedly the best, they had great chemistry and bounced well off each other. The return of Helen Baxendale to our screens was fantastic, she has done a few other one off dramas but none as good as 'Dead Cever'. It's a must see for anyone who is a fan of these dramas and is not the 'terrible drama' that has been described by others.

But don't take my word for it the critics aren't always right as everyone has different tastes, see it before you judge it but you must see it whatever you do.

I just watched this, thought it was pretty good. Not sure what the other reviewer is going on about. Not the most believable story in the world, though it is supposedly based on true events.

Its not exactly Citizen Kane but its an enjoyable way to spend an hour or so without having to put your thinking cap on. Reasonably fast paced and good to see a return to UK screens for Helen Baxendale, who plays her role very well. Kind of think that she could have had more screen time though.

****SPOILER****

However, the one bit that I found a bit hard to believe was the lesbian kiss scene! Just seemed a bit gratuitous, though not unpleasant!

well, i sat all the way threw this drama and thought it was an amazingly written story and thought everyone in it was brilliant, well done itv bring on more. surranne jones was fantastic and so where all the other cast. well done to sally wainwright for great writing and i thoroughly enjoyed the whole think, sorry to the saddo people who commented in the opposite context but they must be in coma's or just feeling sorry for themselves after a miserably seeing the new year in but i thought it was may be the best thing to have entertained us in a very long time, to much reality TV has been our way lately and its good to see some old faces back on our screens.

this drama was absolutely amazing! one slight problem my TV was going funny and well i missed the beginning part and was just wondering if there is anyway i can watch the whole thing again? But i recommend this 100% TOTALLY WIKED. The story line was really good and i don't think i have see something so gripping!

Truly one of ITVs best efforts and well i idolise Surranne Jones and love her method of acting!!!!!

I think the way Julie acting like she didn't know her friend whilst she was running the pub was really effective and i like how she admitted it was her in a sly way!! If anyone can help and let me know where i can watch again i would be very grateful THANKS

I've not been the biggest fan of ITV1 for a while.

Aside from the excellent return of Cracker and Prime Suspect last year there has been a steady amount of poorly scripted, badly acted one off dramas from the channel.

Which meant I wasn't expecting a lot from Dead Clever. But after checking the credits of the writer and director, which includes the excellent Shameless I figured I'd give ITV1 just one more chance.

I'm kinda glad I did.

The TV movie is about how a man, Ian played by Dean Lennox Kelly, in 1994 is convicted of murdering his wife and sentenced to 15 years in prison when in fact his wife, Julie (Suranne Jones), set him up. She disappeared for 10 years until an unexpected meeting with her old school friend, Sarah (Helen Baxendale). The two women then find themselves involved in a relationship that takes a few twists and turns along the way.

I say kinda, because while it was yet another soap star led ITV1 one-off, Suranne Jones wasn't as bad as other ex-soap stars I've seen before (Nigel Harman in The Outsiders springs to mind). Helen Baxendale was good (her accent wasn't) and Dean Lennox Kelly is always reliable.

Visually it was well polished without being too showy and the script was tight enough to keep everything moving at a decent pace.

Labelling this as a black comedy was a bit of a mistake however. It had an element of The War of the Roses but wasn't as dark or twisted as Danny Devito's 1989 film was.

The last act does have a scene reminiscent of Mr & Mrs Smith and comes from almost out of nowhere. I couldn't help but chuckle at its silliness.

This isn't a slice of real life, it's a tongue in cheek silly little TV movie with 2D characters. It's not going to win any awards but as a post New Years Eve switch your brain off piece of comedy drama it was perfectly acceptable.

I'm not sure if it'll ever re-surface on TV or DVD, but it you're fed up with reality singing contests or Ant & Dec then you could do worse than watch this.....probably...

I had high expectations when i saw the trailer for this, it looked amusing and thrilling with a big cast, namely Suranne Jones, Helen Baxendale and the bloke out of Shameless. But after a promising opening five minutes it descended into farce. The script and direction obviously did not know whether this was a serious thriller or a black comedy. It came off as a poor combination of the two. The characters lurch between sympathetic, risible and plain stupid. The ending can only be described as farcical and lazy, obviously copied completely from a famous film (you will know which one if you make it to the ending of this). Clichéd, contrived and an hour too long. Give it a miss.

Before you begin to contemplate whether to spend 2 hours of your precious life watching this utter pile of pathetic rubbish, can I suggest you think of the very worst piece of Television Drama you have ever seen, add 2, multiply by 400, and you will begin to get close as to how bad this drama really was. It's hard to know where to begin to describe why this Drama should never ever have seen the light of day.

Let's begin at the story, I don't know whether this originated in the writers imagination (Sally Wainwright)or was adapted from a Book, but either way they should be utterly ashamed to put there name to this script. It defied every last ounce of reality, never knowing whether to play it for comedy or serious, and failing miserably on both fronts. Advertised as a "Black Comedy", then I suggest that ITV should be prosecuted under the Trade descriptions Act. It was most definitely NOT comedy and the only Black was the Bin liner where the whole project should have been consigned.

Sometimes a film or drama can be so bad it ends up being good because you end up laughing so much, however I just ended up feeling angry at having my intelligence insulted so much by this feeble effort. Quite how other people who reviewed this found this "Fabulous" defies belief, it just goe's to show that the quality gene in some people went sadly missing at conception.

To be fair to the actors, there was not a lot you could do to recover the inane script, but why oh why do people at ITV believe that Suranne Jones is a leading actress, admittedly she is a gorgeous gal, but I saw better acting from 2 Christmas trees in our local Panto last week (Please ITV, the Girl CAN'T ACT !!!!!! stop trying to turn her into a Star Vehicle). I hope Dean Lennox Lewis picked up a hefty check for appearing in this rubbish, and now returns to The excellent "Shameless" with instructions to his agent to never again accept calls from ITV's Drama Dept.

It is clear that ITV are determined to dumb the channel down to the most basic moronic television eg X Factor, I'm a celebrity,endless reality shows,in other words "The Chavs Channel" and now ITV Drama seem intent on joining this stampede.

If you have videoed Dead Clever, can I suggest you fast forward to the Adverts and watch them instead, believe me at least that way you will retain the will to live.

By the way, my friend Carol loved Dead Clever but then again, she has been in a Coma for the last seven years