American Friends

In the 1860s, the Reverend Francis Ashby is a fussy senior tutor at St. John's College, Oxford, who hopes to become head of the college when the aging, near-senile president finally passes on. Before going off on his Swiss holiday, Ashby, a classics scholar, is the picture of the smug, self-satisfied don, content in the celibacy that is required of a man in his position. In the course of his holiday he meets the Misses Caroline Hartley, a handsome, middle-aged American woman, and her beautiful, Irish-born adopted daughter, Elinor. Both women find Ashby immensely attractive and follow him back to Oxford, where Ashby finds himself torn between his desire to take over the presidency of the college and his even stronger desire not to be a bachelor all his life. (Cinemax)