JOHN SSEBUNYA

It is believed that John Ssebunya (pictured above) spent three years living in the Ugandan forests, from the age of just two, after fleeing his home following his mother’s murder (carried out by his father). Ssebunya claims to have been cared for by a troop of vervet monkeys and his entire body was covered in hair when he was discovered hiding in a tree in 1991 by a local tribeswoman. She was at first repelled by both the boy and his monkey friends, but Ssebunya has now re-entered human society. He joined a touring children’s choir. granny frocks, who loses her job at a tea shop. She becomes the paid companion to Will Traynor (Sam Claflin), a handsome exCity-boy whose once-golden life has been blighted by quadriplegia.

You know every next scene in store for these two. He’s bitter, aloof, and pondering suicide. She’s a silly one. How she dresses! Will’s mother (Janet McTeer) has hired Louisa to come to their whopping castle of a place, as the latest in a long line of sacrificial lambs, one of whom she hopes might coo and charm her son out of despair.

If you like, it’s Fifty Shades of Grey, with the Red Room of Pain replaced by Claflin’s sarcasm in a wheelchair. And no sex.

Before long, you realise who the real prisoner is. Clarke, bugging out with her deerin-the-headlights face, and then going super-expressive when the love story kicks in, gives such a crackers performance that you may start to worry for Louisa’s mental health.

Claflin has good moments. As in The Riot Club, he can do curdled charm. You just wish director Thea Sharrock weren’t so determined to slush this up. Every song choice is an unholy nightmare, and the lavish setdressing makes it a tragic disability romance with a gratuitous side order of property porn. — Tim Robey © The Daily Telegraph, London