Breathe begins in the 1950s, in the grounds of a beautiful country house, where Robin Cavendish (Andrew Garfield), a charming young man, is playing cricket while simultaneously falling for Diana Blacker (Claire Foy). The feeling is clearly mutual and it's not long before the besotted pair are married and heading to Kenya (Robin works as a tea broker), where life is seemingly idyllic. It is here that Robin contracts polio and is confined to a hospital bed; he is given only months to live a very limited life.

Based on a true story, Andy Serkis' directorial debut is a beautiful, sweeping love story. While some may say it walks the line of sentimentality, I found it totally endearing and fell in love with the Cavendish family and their close-knit group of friends. While the film focuses on Cavendish's illness and the revolutionary ideals of him, his wife and their supportive friends, it is ultimately a story of lasting love, family and the ability to change what has gone before.

Garfield and Foy play the post-colonial couple with a great deal of pathos and empathy, telling the story of Robin and Diana Cavendish with care and delicacy. This is certainly no mean feat for Garfield who spends most of the film only able to act from the neck up, and he does it superbly. The ever-present group of friends bring light relief, most notably in the form of Tom Hollander who plays Diana's twin brothers with a distinctly quirked eyebrow; their constant bickering and tomfoolery lighting up every scene they are in.

Appearances from Hugh Bonneville (playing Teddy Hall – inventor of Robin's respiratory chair) and Stephen Mangan (Dr. Clement Aitken – who ultimately gets said chair to a wider audience) also provide a refreshing break from the close-knit group and deliver an injection of humour and discernment to the film, respectively.

While I took from the film a story of love against all adversity, it is certainly not a one-dimensional story. The discrimination of the disabled is brought to the foreground throughout, initially when Cavendish is first struck down with the debilitating illness and later at a German hospital for the severely disabled that is more of a futuristic prison than a place for treatment and care.

The whole production is packaged in a golden sheen, the cinematography perhaps harkening back to a time where the stiff upper lip was all, and it was important to remain positive, whatever the situation. That idealism only added to my enjoyment of the film.

Finally, kudos to the Phoenix Picturehouse for their display of actual props (the second incarnation of the Cavendish chair and a couple of the costumes worn by the main characters) from the film. I was disappointed to learn, however, that the reason the props were on display was because Jonathan Cavendish (the film's producer and the son of Robin and Diana) and his mother had visited the Phoenix earlier this week for a post-film Q&A session, which I sadly missed. I would love to have had that aspect of the real people behind the story.