TULIP FEVER (15)

FILMED in the summer of 2014 before lead actress Alicia Vikander deservedly won her Oscar as Best Supporting Actress for The Danish Girl, director Justin Chadwick’s lust-fuelled period romp has been wilting on a film studio shelf for more than three years.

Harvey Weinstein’s involvement as a producer can’t be blamed for the delay.

Tulip Fever is a turgid, lifeless adaptation of Deborah Moggach’s novel, which fails to bloom on the big screen despite some half-hearted propagation from director Justin Chadwick (The Other Boleyn Girl) and his starry international cast.

Not even Dame Judi Dench, pursing her lips beneath a wimple, can inject life into a plodding, water-logged narrative in which a lowly fisherman brandishes a basket of pungent goods and tantalises one potential customer by boasting “I’ve got a nice thick eel” with a straight face.

Codswallop, more like.