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.
To promote the new Blu-ray release Shirley
Anne Field spoke to journalist Matthew Sweet on BBC Radio 4’s Film Programme. She
recalled of Mortimer “John was a very wishful
man and he also became all the things he wished. He wished for lovers and
intrigues and divorces and marriages and lots of children. And he got it all. I
don’t know how to say this but a very slight seediness in the man is part of
John. He also had a very sweet side...for 10 years he was very closely in my
life and I remember all the joy and warmth he brought to it. John had this ear
for dialogue.â€
Filmed
in a small studio in Marylebone, the shoot consisted of a very small crew and
was according to Field, quite casual. New scenes were written daily with
Mortimer literally noting down conversations amongst the cast and crew and
writing them into the script for authenticity. “He’d listen to what you had to
say. And then the next day a whole new page of dialogue would come. And I
wondered why it was so easy to say. Now I realise it was the rhythms of our own
speech or something we had actually said. It was the most wonderful experience.
I think it was the most enjoyable film I’ve ever done because it was so small,
because we all worked so closely together and we all cared about by each other.
It was like an intense love affair between several people.â€
Lunch Hour was produced by
Eyeline Films – a small London based production company that specialised in
documentary and advertising films. It was run by a group of close friends who
shared a passion for quality films with a realist angle: producers Anthony
Perry, Alfred Shaughnessy and directors Guy Hamilton and Charles Frend and
backed by actor Kenneth More. Eyeline’s success allowed the company to venture
into short feature films. Hill was given
creative freedom and also wrote the score for the film.
Due
to its length – only 63 minutes – Lunch
Hour only received a limited release. Not only was it too short for an A or
B feature its content wasn’t for the mainstream either. Today the film does feel very dated but it
does give us an insight into the early discontent women were experiencing in
Britain. It’s a brave choice for Flipside but doesn’t quite have the punch that
other titles in the series have had.
BFI Dual Edition (Flipside 017) / Released 25
April 2011 / Cat no: BFIB1042 / UK / Cert U / black and white / English
language / 63 mins / original aspect ratio 1.66:1 / Region 0 // Disc 1: BD50 /
1080p / 24fps / PCM mono audio (48k/24-bit) // Disc 2: DVD9 / PAL / PCM mono
audio (48k/24-bit) (Extras Dolby Digital 320 kbps)
CLICK HERE TO ORDER FROM AMAZON UK
CLICK HERE TO READ MATTHEW FIELD'S COVERAGE OF SHIRLEY ANNE FIELD'S RECENT INTERVIEW AT THE BFI IN LONDON