All the Right Noises | |
---|---|
Directed by | Gerry O'Hara |
Written by | Gerry O'Hara |
Produced by | John Quested Si Litvinoff |
Starring | Olivia Hussey Tom Bell Judy Carne |
Cinematography | Gerry Fisher |
Edited by | Antony Gibbs |
Music by | Melanie |
Production companies | Max L. Raab-Si Litvinoff Films Trigon Productions |
Distributed by | 20th Century Fox |
Release date |
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Running time | 92 minutes [1] |
Country | United Kingdom |
Language | English |
All the Right Noises is a 1971 British romantic drama film written and directed by Gerry O'Hara and starring Tom Bell, Olivia Hussey, Judy Carne and John Standing. [2]
Len Lewin is a man happily married to his wife Joy and father of two young children, who works as a lighting technician for a theatrical company. Despite his commitment to his family, he sleeps with Val, an actress in the show, who then reveals she is fifteen. Despite this he continues the affair. The young woman believes she might be pregnant but is not. The affair ends amicably and the man's wife never finds out.
Judy Carne said the film was based on a real-life incident involving Gerry O'Hara's friend Nicholas Roeg, who recommended Carne to play Tom Bell's wife as Carne resembled Roeg's wife. [3]
O'Hara said he wrote the film with Tom Bell in mind for the lead role as he was friends with Bell since they made The L Shaped Room (1962) together. O'Hara gave the script to Roeg who helped set up the project with Si Litvinoff, who produced Walkabout (1971) and was interested making a film in England. [4]
It was the first in a slate of films from Max Raab and Litvinoff that also included A Clockwork Orange (1971).
Although made in 1969 it was not released until 1971. [5]
Filming began in London in April 1969. It was a nine week shoot and O'Hara said "I had pretty much total creative control, which is very rare." He also said "I love that film ... probably my best film." [4]
The Monthly Film Bulletin wrote: "After a couple of rather nondescript espionage adventures, Gerry O'Hara here makes a welcome return to the mood of his earlier Pleasure Girls (1965). Combining adultery with an old-fashioned backstage setting, All the Right Noises does nothing more than rework familiar themes; but it is built on a solid framework of disciplined direction and animated performances (particularly from Judy Carne in her first leading role), and O'Hara's own script, strong on characterisation, makes the vacillating emotions credible and keeps the dialogue refreshingly natural. (Joy's first post-coital murmur is 'As much as I love you, if you don't move soon you're gonna crush me ribs'). Some idyllic chases around parks and beaches are the only regrettable lapses; and although it seems indulgent of O'Hara to develop the sequence of Joy's premature arrival home into a suspense sketch (constant intercutting between Joy's rapid progress from the airport, and Val taking an age to leave the flat), like nearly everything else in the film, it does work." [6]
Variety said the film had "tenuous ties to the angry-young-man school of British filmmaking in the late fifties, but lacks the force, ire and social attitudes. Instead, all concerned seem unconcerned, voices are never raised and the atmosphere remains one of self-consciously “adult” sensibility that generates little dramatic excitement." [5]
The Evening Standard called it "accurate and compelling". [7]
Liverpool Daily Post called it "neatly observed and nicely edited." [8]
Leslie Halliwell said: "Sharp, sensible treatment of a cliché situation, as watchable as a superior television play." [9]
The Radio Times Guide to Films gave the film 3/5 stars, writing: "This study of age-gap passion in Swinging London sat on a sheif for two years and is a difficult watch in the post-Savile era, given that it follows the developing relationship between 30 something theatre electrician Tom Bell and chorus giri Olivia Hussey. Trouble is, he has forgotten to mention he has a wife and kids, and she's omitted that she's 15 and still at school. Capturing the free love spirit of the time, O'Hara refuses to judge either, but viewed now this is bound to provoke debate." [10]
The BFI released All the Right Noises on DVD and Blu-ray through its Flipside strand. [11]
Olivia Hussey is a British-Argentine actress. Her awards include a Golden Globe Award and a David di Donatello Award. The daughter of Argentine opera singer Andrés Osuna, Hussey was born in Buenos Aires but spent most of her early life in her mother's native England. She aspired to become an actress at a young age and studied drama for five years at Italia Conti Academy of Theatre Arts in London.
Lost Horizon is a 1973 musical fantasy adventure film directed by Charles Jarrott and starring Peter Finch, Liv Ullmann, Sally Kellerman, George Kennedy, Michael York, Olivia Hussey, Bobby Van, James Shigeta, Charles Boyer and John Gielgud. It was also the final film produced by Ross Hunter. The film is a remake of Frank Capra's 1937 film of the same name, with a screenplay by Larry Kramer. Both stories were adapted from James Hilton's 1933 novel Lost Horizon.
Walkabout is a 1971 adventure survival film directed by Nicolas Roeg and starring Jenny Agutter, Luc Roeg, and David Gulpilil. Edward Bond wrote the screenplay, which is loosely based on the 1959 novel by James Vance Marshall. It centres on two white schoolchildren who are left to fend for themselves in the Australian Outback and who come across a teenage Aboriginal boy who helps them to survive.
Joyce Audrey Botterill, known professionally as Judy Carne, was an English actress best remembered for the phrase "Sock it to me!" on Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In.
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Insignificance is a 1985 British alternate history drama film directed by Nicolas Roeg, and starring Gary Busey, Michael Emil, Theresa Russell, Tony Curtis, and Will Sampson. Adapted by Terry Johnson from his 1982 play of the same name, the film follows four famous characters who converge in a New York City hotel one night in 1954: Joe DiMaggio, Albert Einstein, Marilyn Monroe, and Joseph McCarthy—billed as The Ballplayer, The Professor, The Actress and The Senator, respectively.
Thomas George Bell was an English actor on stage, film and television. He often played "menacing or seedy roles, perhaps most memorably playing sexist Detective Sergeant Bill Otley, antagonist to Helen Mirren's DCI Jane Tennison in Prime Suspect.
Leonard Whiting is a British semi-retired actor and singer best known for his teenage role as Romeo in Franco Zeffirelli's 1968 film version of Romeo and Juliet, a role which earned him the Golden Globe Award for New Star of the Year – Actor in 1969.
Imagine is a 1972 feature-length music film by John Lennon and Yoko Ono, filmed at their Tittenhurst Park home in Ascot, England, and in various locations in London and New York between May and September 1971. All the songs from Lennon's 1971 Imagine album appear in the soundtrack, and also the songs "Mrs. Lennon", "Mind Train", "Don't Count the Waves" and "Midsummer New York" from Ono's 1971 album FLY.
Island of Terror is a 1966 British horror film directed by Terence Fisher and starring Peter Cushing and Edward Judd. The screenplay was by Edward Mann and Al Ramsen. It was produced by Planet Film Productions. The film was released in the United States by Universal Studios on a double bill with The Projected Man (1966).
Glastonbury Fayre is a 1972 documentary film directed by Peter Neal and Nicolas Roeg. It covers the 1971 Glastonbury Festival which took place on 20 to 24 June 1971 in rural Somerset in England. It was released in May 1972.
Gerald O'Hara was a British film and television writer and director.
The Spy's Wife is a 1972 British short crime film directed by Gerry O'Hara and starring Ann Lynn, Dorothy Tutin, Tom Bell, Vladek Sheybal and Julian Holloway.
The Pleasure Girls is a 1965 British drama film directed by Gerry O'Hara and starring Francesca Annis, Ian McShane and Klaus Kinski.
That Kind of Girl is a 1963 British film starring Margaret Rose Keil, David Weston and Linda Marlowe. It was the directorial debut of Gerry O'Hara, and produced by Robert Hartford-Davis with a script by Jan Read. Michael Klinger and Tony Tenser were Executive Producers.
BFI Flipside is a series of Dual Format Editions which was launched in May 2009 and is published by the British Film Institute's Video label. The series so far features a total of 65 feature and short films, as well as 10 archive interviews with the likes of Spike Milligan, Peter Cook and Richard Lester.
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