The Governess

(Columbia Tristar)

SandGoldbacher's provocative debut is buoyed by its lush Early Victorian setting and by a radiant Minnie Driver as the intelligent, iconoclastic, and Jewish Rosina Da Silva, who changes her name to Mary Blackchurch and obtains a position as governess on the isle of Skye. Soon she's helping her employer, Mr. Cavendish (Tom Wilkinson), with his pre-Daguerreotype photography experiments -- and they wind up modeling for each other.