DVD REVIEW: "LUNCH HOUR" RELEASED BY THE BFI

nospam@example.com (Cinema Retro) — Tue, 05 Jul 2011 05:27:00 -0500

By Matthew Field

The BFI's Flipside label continues on its mission to expose the hidden history of British cinema, presenting a little seen film which explores changing attitudes towards sex and gender equality in 1960s Britain – Lunch Hour.

Shirley Anne Field is best remembered for her flawless performances in Karel Reisz’ Saturday Night and Sunday Morning and Tony Richardson’s The Entertainer. But her personal favourite from this era is this little known self-contained drama. Field gives a fiery performance as a young designer on the brink of an affair with a married male executive (Robert Stephens) at the company where she works. With a tightly-focused plot telling the story of an illicit lunch-hour rendezvous in ‘real-time’, this is a stylish and highly-charged story of subterfuge, simmering tensions and sexual conflict.

Lunch Hour was directed by documentary filmmaker James Hill who later went on to helm Born Free. Previously a radio play and a theatre production, it was adapted for the screen in 1962. Written by John Mortimer - a British barrister who later became a dramatist, screenwriter and author – it’s been said that the script was semi-autobiographical. In the accompanying booklet film historian Sue Harper points out “The sexual radicalism of Lunch Hour owes something to his marriage [Mortimer] to his first wife Penelope. The couple had a tumultuous relationship, and it’s possible to argue that John Mortimer’s guilt about his many adulteries, provided a stimulus for Lunch Hour.” The original lead in the stage play was Wendy Craig by whom Mortimer had a son. According to Harper he then actively pursued Field during the production, after having offered her agent generous percentages to appear in the film.

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IF IT'S WEIRD, BRITISH AND FORGOTTEN, THEN IT'S BFI FLIPSIDE MATERIAL

nospam@example.com (Cinema Retro) — Tue, 10 May 2011 04:12:00 -0500

By Matthew Field

BFI Flipside was launched in May 2009 with a mission to expose the hidden history of British cinema by releasing restored prints on DVD and Blu-ray of British films that have slipped through the cracks of time. Now on its 17th release the label has released everything from exploitation documentaries about the seedy sixties (London In The Raw) to B-movies featuring Oliver Reed (The Party's Over), Shirley Anne Field (Lunch Hour), Klaus Kinski (The Pleasure Girls) and Withnail & I director Bruce Robinson (Private Road). If it's weird, British and forgotten, then it's Flipside.

Developed from its popular monthly screening slot at BFI Southbank, the Flipside titles are newly mastered to High Definition from original film elements, and are presented with rare and fascinating special features - including previously unavailable short films, documentaries and archival interviews, many of which are preserved in the BFI National Archive. Each title comes in collectable numbered packaging and is accompanied by an extensive illustrated booklet with insightful contributions from special guest writers, often including the filmmakers themselves.

Over the coming months Cinema Retro will be taking a look at each of these entries - embarking on an alternative journey into the wonderful world of 60s and 70s British cinema. The latest release is Joanna – the 1968 feature film debut of pop singer turned fashion photographer - Michael Sarne.

This modish sixties drama tracks the story of seventeen-year-old Joanna - a cool, stylish, and determined young woman who is just beginning a new life as an art student in swinging London. Played with gusto by Genevieve Waite, Joanna indulges in the pleasures of casual sexual encounters, colourful daydreams, and an impromptu trip to Morocco with the wise and debonair Lord Peter Sanderson (wonderfully played by Donald Sutherland). But when Joanna falls in love with Gordon, from Sierra Leone, her life begins to get complicated.

Director Michael Sarne is best remembered in the UK for his No 1 single Come Outside but history has forgotten his feature film debut which ended up competing for the Palme d’Or in Cannes. Sarne pitched the film as the female Alfie and secured financing from Fox after they released his short - a travelogue titled The Road To St Tropez - as a B picture to James Coburn’s spy thriller In Like Flint. His companion on the trip was Joanne Roncarelli - a carefree girl from Frome in Somerset, England. In the accompanying DVD booklet Sarne reveals to Chris Campion how Roncarelli became his inspiration for Joanna. “[Joanne] had been a waitress in the Saint-Tropez. She was art student and she’d nick clothes from shops. You don’t often lie in bed with a girl who will tell you about her affairs in this completely personal sort of way. I thought it was fascinating because I don’t usually get that sort of dialogue from girls. This girl had 57 different lovers she was telling me about in the morning!”

Sarne had wanted to cast his then girlfriend Gabriella Licudi in the lead but was vetoed by producer Michael Laughlin. Sarne subsequently cast the unknown 19 year old South African model Genevieve Waite who he discovered on a Knightsbridge catwalk. “Genevieve had big, deep circles under her eyes and obviously couldn’t act. All she had going for her was that she had a figure like Twiggy.”

Although the film may look dated today, Sarne bottled the youthful free-spirit attitude and Carnaby Street style fashion perfectly. It’s the ultimate swinging London film – it’s colourful and it makes the city look fantastic. He also interweaves darker shades into the film with pregnancies, abortions and beatings. Sarne was an avid Fellini fan and aimed to make Joanna the London Dolce Vita – by creating surreal dream sequences and bold set pieces to convey a world-within-a-world inhabited by the characters.

Sarne told Bob Stranley in the Guardian recently “For all Joanna’s faults, it does reflect the dizziness and silliness of 60s London. And the happiness – people really did dress up and show off. Some people like to look back and think it was all Ken Loach and Mike Leigh, but we had fast cars, Brigitte Bardot was in town, and we all had affairs in Rome and Paris. It didn’t just happen to the Beatles.”

This new BFI release comes with a plethora of extras. As well as Sarne’s 1966 short which resulted in him making Joanna – The Road To Saint Tropez, the BFI have also included an unusual short Death Maybe Your Santa Claus – an experimental examination of an interracial relationship in 1960s London. The disc also features an on-stage interview with Sarne at the BFI Southbank, and a downloadable PDF of his novel based on the film.

Joanna (Flipside 0016) RRP £19.99 Cat no: BFIB1062 / UK, US / 1968 / Cert 18 / colour / English language / 113 mins / original aspect ratio 2.35:1 / Region 2 // Disc 1: BD50 / 1080p / 24fps / PCM mono audio (48k/24bit) // Disc 2: DVD9 / PAL / Dolby Digital mono audio (320 kbps)

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Celebrating Films of the 1960s & 1970s - Matthew Field

DVD REVIEW: "LUNCH HOUR" RELEASED BY THE BFI

IF IT'S WEIRD, BRITISH AND FORGOTTEN, THEN IT'S BFI FLIPSIDE MATERIAL