Saturday Night And Sunday Morning | Albert Finney, Shirley Anne Field

Saturday Night And Sunday Morning | Albert Finney, Shirley Anne Field | Saturday Night and Sunday Morning

DVDs:

Saturday Night And...

	Saturday Night And Sunday Morning Albert Finney, Shirley Anne Field Continental Distributing, 2002 average customer review:based on 12 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

In his first starring role, Albert Finney gained international acclaim for his impressive (TheNew Yorker) portrayal of Arthur Seaton, a rebellious factory worker who lives only for his wild, carefree nights at the pub. A remarkable and influential drama that captures the despair of working class life, Saturday Night and Sunday Morning is 'superbly enacted [and] one of the best ofBritain's 'angry young men dramas of the 60s. (Leonard Maltin). The sights and sounds of industrial Nottingham resonate with a grimy thud as Arthur Seaton works his tedious factory job. Through ale, women and practical jokes, he vents his frustrations against the establishments of work and marriage until his reckless ways lead him to a night that changes his life. Forced to reevaluate his convictions, Arthur must decide exactly what he stands for

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Finney Explodes On the Screen With a Vengeance

"Saturday Night and Sunday Morning" is one of the finest examples of cinema that emerged in Britain from the late Fifties and early Sixties. For sure there is a lot of despair on display here but there is also a glimmer of hope for happiness. Arthur Seaton (Albert Finney), stuck in a meaningless job with little hope for advancement beyond his class, doesn't so much lash out but engages in wreckless and self-destructive behavior. He drinks to excess, he carries on affair with a meek co-worker's wife (Rachel Roberts), he torments a busy-body neighbor with an air gun, he teases the ladies at his plant with a dead rat. Arthur isn't so much angry just stifled. The best chance for redemption is the love of a working-class girl, Doreen (Shirley-Anne Field). Arthur just basically has to do some growing up and brush off the inequities of class-conscious Britain. Finney absolutely mesmerizes in his starring debut. For sure, Arthur engages in some outrageous behavior, but Finney never overplays it. Director Karel Reisz perfectly captures the grimy working class milieu. Essential viewing. On a final note, when are they going to properly re-issue Lindsay Anderson's "This Sporting Life" with Richard Harris and Rachel Roberts, another fine example of British film from the early Sixties.

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Saturday Night and Sunday Morning

Another top quality, British "kitchen-sink" drama from the 1960s, Reisz's film launched Finney to prominence after a promising debut in Tony Richardson's "The Entertainer." Drowning five days of stagnation in one night's revelry--or is it oblivion?--Arthur is the quintessential "angry young man," as he is going nowhere and won't let himself care, either about short-term inconveniences or long-term consequences. Finney is magnetic in the lead, and both Roberts and Shirley Ann Field make compelling love interests. Finney would go on to cement his stardom in the incomparable "Tom Jones".

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Saturday Night, Sunday Morning

Classic early 60s British movie. Fine example of how Britain was struggling to pull away from the austerity of the post WWII years. Tremendous acting by a famous British cast. Launched Albert Finney's career - and you can see why. I am 51 now and it reminds me of the landscape I grew up in as a young child. Watch, learn and enjoy!

Braggodocio...and the thumbing of the nose

This is the film that put Finney on the map, as the saying goes, and for good reason. He's a great actor, but his performance is more than individual; it's also symbolic of some anger afoot in the UK at the time--i.e., the "angry young men". More specifically, the combination of Finney's sex appeal and braggodocio thumbs its nose at the stereotypical image of Great Britain as the stuffy, staid upholder of propriety and good manners and lords and ladies, et cetera.

His character, Arthur, is working class through and through, and it shows in every scene. He drinks and womanizes and plays tricks--mostly on older women he considers representative of stuffiness and stupidity. But he's callous himself--not stupid, but callous. This is really a slice of life movie that, more than anything else, portrays the British working class in the 1960s pretty much as they were. It's a great companion piece to another excellent British film, "The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner", also from the 1960s, and also featuring a young British actor making his debut, Tom Courtenay.

Finney is electric in his role. What's especially good about this film is that it doesn't so much copy or emulate American movies--in departing from the image of British culture as proper, etc.--as it presents an entirely new type of film, that reveals the day-to-day lives of British workers and societal hangers-on, those who can never take anything for granted.

Thumbing one's nose symbolically and cinematically here is producer Tony Richardson, who went on to direct Finney in "Tom Jones" (a masterpiece, I would say) and director Karel Reisz, a Polish-born Brit who went on to direct a number of other interesting films.

But the biggest nose-thumber of all here is Albert Finney. The ending is deeply ironic because we can see that in short order he'll give up his nose-thumbing ways and settle down with a cute girl who has no higher ambitions, basically, than he does. Will that last? Given Arther's character, it doesn't seem likely.

It's nice to see that Finney is still active in cinema. This debut is stunning and for sure well worth seeing.

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reviews: page 1, 2, 3

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