simply beautiful . one of the best mind umm . screw in existence . both rickman and stowe play their role to the hilt in this tale of a childrens book writer who maybe . have write a subversive tract . moscow could learn a few thing from the torture techniques in this film . they could also do bad than hire alan rickman . five out of five star and and at present ( 1 20 2000 ) # 2 on my top 100 film of all time list .