Once broken up, can a family ever be mended again? Jolyon Chadwick, a famous television presenter, takes his new girlfriend Henrietta home meet his extended family – and also to meet Marie, the mother who deserted him and his father many years ago, now re-appeared and seeming to want forgiveness. Jolyon, however, is not in the mood for forgiveness – although his father Hal, now married to his cousin and childhood sweetheart, feels a lingering guilt about Marie and wants them all to be friends. And Henrietta, still vulnerable from the break-up of her own parents' marriage, is not sure whether she can move on.