The often one note-film is partly saved by the performances, particularly when Grant plays Chauncey as less rake than a creepy, fragile impostor, shown best when practising his smile in the mirror and clearly falling apart.

There’s something grubbily compelling about this tale of venal people and their doomed pursuit of power.

It’s too respectable to entirely ignore, yet too obvious and coarse to entertain those whose attention it courts.

It's a bit of a shambles, but we've all seen worse films than this.