The sleepy English hamlet of Little Wallop is about to receive a rude awakening, as the absent-minded Reverend Walter Goodman (Rowan Atkinson), his dissatisfied wife Gloria (Kristin Scott Thomas), and their two children, Holly and Petey, await the arrival of their new housekeeper, Grace Hawkins (Maggie Smith). Gloria is a woman struggling to cope.

Her teenage daughter's a nymphomaniac, her young son's the perennial target for the local bullies, and her marriage to Walter has long-since dwindled into monotony.

It's no wonder she's failing to resist the advances of her handsome, American, lothario of a golf pro, Lance (Patrick Swayze). What this family needs is salvation.

And fast. It comes in the form of "Grace Hawkins", a gentle motherly woman with a smile for everyone and an answer for everything. But Grace is not all she seems...