Say Hello to Yesterday | |
---|---|
Directed by | Alvin Rakoff |
Screenplay by | Alvin Rakoff and Peter King (from an original story by Alvin Rakoff and Ray Mathew) |
Produced by | Josef Shaftel |
Starring | Jean Simmons Leonard Whiting Evelyn Laye Derek Francis Geoffrey Bayldon James Cossins Frank Middlemass Gwen Nelson |
Cinematography | Geoffrey Unsworth |
Edited by | Ralph Sheldon |
Music by | Riz Ortolani |
Production company | Joseph Shaftel Productions |
Distributed by | Cinerama Releasing Corporation |
Release date |
|
Running time | 96 minutes |
Country | United Kingdom |
Language | English |
Budget | $1.2 million [1] or more than £500,000 [2] |
Say Hello to Yesterday is a 1971 British romantic comedy-drama film directed by Alvin Rakoff and starring Jean Simmons and Leonard Whiting. It was written by Rakoff and Peter King, based on an original story by Rakoff and Ray Mathew.
The film covers ten hours in the life of a suburban housewife.
On a winter morning in an affluent suburb, the Woman – having just said goodbye to her stockbroker husband and their two young children – is going to London, shopping. She drives to the station which is shown as Cobham (referencing Cobham, Surrey or Cobham, Kent). Among the crowd, as she boards the train is the Boy. It is his birthday today and he's determined to make the day a different one.
The Boy moves up and down the crowded corridors. The Woman in her non-smoking compartment badly wants a cigarette and starts to scrape away a 'No Smoking' sign. The Boy is attracted by this middle class rebellion, pulls the sign off and presents it to her and tries to engage her in conversation.
Later, battling her way into a department store she finds he has followed her. Leaving the store, she thinks she has lost him. But he catches up with her on a crowded pavement. She tries to throw him off, he finds her again. She flees to her mother's apartment – followed by the Boy. The Woman is desperately embarrassed and tries to explain, but her mother treats the whole thing lightly and the Woman learns with surprise that her parents both had affairs with other people during the war. Mother says 'He's good for you. If you have an affair with that boy you'll regret it. On the other hand, if you don't have an affair with him you'll also regret it...' He tells an estate agent that he is a successful talent agent and gets the keys to an empty flat. The Woman and the Boy have sex together there. He tells her that he loves her and suggests they have an affair, but she declines his offer. She goes to London Victoria station and goes home.
Actor | Role |
---|---|
Jean Simmons | The Woman |
Leonard Whiting | The Boy |
Evelyn Laye | The Woman's mother |
Derek Francis | park keeper |
Geoffrey Bayldon | estate agent |
James Cossins | policeman |
Edward Atienza | porter |
Frank Middlemass | station master |
Gwen Nelson | char at Labour Exchange |
Constance Chapman | The Boy's mother (uncredited) |
Jack Woolgar | The Boy's father (uncredited) |
Ellis Dale | train passenger (uncredited) |
Harry Fielder | bus conductor (uncredited) |
Susan Penhaligon | girl on train (uncredited) |
Jimmy Gardner | balloon seller (uncredited) |
According to Rakoff, Say Hello to Yesterday was "a 1970 Brief Encounter a picture designed purely for entertainment, with no morals or messages unless the public like to find them." [3]
Jean Simmons returned to London after a five-year absence to star in the film.[ citation needed ]
According to Rakoff, "The original title was to have been Whatever Happened to Happy Endings? but Cinerama didn't want to use this title, partly because Jean Simmons had just starred in and been Academy Award nominated for, the similarly titled The Happy Ending and partly because Cinerama feared that because Whatever Happened to Baby Jane? was a film of the era and there was a series of Whatever Happened... films, they might be sued by other companies." [4]
Filming took ten weeks in London at Twickenham Studios and on location in London, [5] London, Slough, Hampshire and Ascot railway station.[ citation needed ]
Music was by Riz Ortolani. He was not the choice of the director who cut the film to the music of Joni Mitchell and Donovan's "Colours". [6]
The Monthly Film Bulletin wrote: "Optimistically described as a 'Brief Encounter of the Seventies', this arch and cold-blooded romance is a long way from anything other than its own modish contemporaries, and Alvin Rakoff surrenders with complete abandon to the principle that visual effects take precedence over the story being told: no sooner have the couple finished an obligatory stint on the swings and slides at the children's playground than they are whisked into the Planetarium or to the top of the Post Office Tower. And when the affair is over, the boy's last defiant gesture takes the form of releasing a bunch of balloons over Victoria Station (which presumably looks more photogenic than Waterloo, the actual departure point for trains to Cobham). Jean Simmons performs throughout with a detached dignity – an indispensable quality for clambering through climbing frames – but Leonard Whiting, accustomed to playing more orthodox young lovers, is no match for the part of the boy, a larger than life character at the best of times and a hazily defined one at worst." [7]
Variety called it "a silly and contrived meant-to-be modish version of Brief Encounter" in which the Whiting's character "is just too banal to be believable, and his entics, which are meant to be cute, are simply adolescent and embarrassing. Commercial prospects appear dim." [8]
Jean Merilyn Simmons was a British actress and singer. One of J. Arthur Rank's "well-spoken young starlets," she appeared predominantly in films, beginning with those made in Britain during and after the Second World War, followed mainly by Hollywood films from 1950 onwards.
Diary of a Mad Black Woman is a 2005 American romantic comedy drama film directed by Darren Grant and written by Tyler Perry. Inspired by the play of the same name, it marks Perry's feature film debut and is the first entry in the Madea film franchise. Starring Perry alongside Kimberly Elise, Steve Harris, Shemar Moore, and Cicely Tyson, it tells the story of a woman who is thrown out of her house by her husband on their 18th wedding anniversary and subsequently moves in with her grandmother, and is the only film written, but not directed, by Perry.
The Touch is a 1971 Swedish romantic drama film directed and written by Ingmar Bergman and starring Max von Sydow, Bibi Andersson, Elliott Gould, and Sheila Reid. The film tells the story of an affair between a married woman and an impetuous foreigner. It contains references to the Virgin Mary and the Holocaust.
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.
Hoffman is a 1970 British drama film directed by Alvin Rakoff and starring Peter Sellers, Sinéad Cusack, Ruth Dunning and Jeremy Bulloch. It is the tale of an older man who blackmails an attractive young woman into spending a week with him in his flat in London, hoping that she will forget her crooked fiancé and fall in love with him instead.
Vivian Blaine was an American actress and singer, best known for originating the role of Miss Adelaide in the musical theater production of Guys and Dolls, as well as appearing in the subsequent film version, in which she co-starred with Marlon Brando, Jean Simmons and Frank Sinatra.
My Night at Maud's, also known as My Night with Maud (UK), is a 1969 French New Wave drama film by Éric Rohmer. It is the third film in his series of Six Moral Tales.
Jazzin' for Blue Jean is a 21-minute short film featuring David Bowie and directed by Julien Temple. It was created to promote Bowie's single "Blue Jean" in 1984 and released as a video single.
Darling Lili is a 1970 American romantic-musical spy film, written by William Peter Blatty and Blake Edwards, the latter also directing the film. It stars Julie Andrews, Rock Hudson, and Jeremy Kemp, with music by Henry Mancini and lyrics by Johnny Mercer. This was the last full musical to have song lyrics written by Mercer.
The Anniversary is a 1968 British black comedy film directed by Roy Ward Baker for Hammer Films and Seven Arts and starring Bette Davis. The screenplay, by Jimmy Sangster, was adapted from Bill MacIlwraith's 1966 play.
Life at the Top is a 1965 British drama film, a production of Romulus Films released by Columbia Pictures. The screenplay was by Mordecai Richler, based on the 1962 novel Life at the Top by John Braine, and is a sequel to the film Room at the Top (1959). It was directed by Ted Kotcheff and produced by James Woolf, with William Kirby as associate producer. The music score was by Richard Addinsell and the cinematography by Oswald Morris. The film's art director, Edward Marshall, received a 1966 BAFTA Award nomination.
The Statue is a 1971 British comedy film starring David Niven, Robert Vaughn, and Virna Lisi and directed by Rodney Amateau. John Cleese and Graham Chapman appear in early career roles as the Niven character's psychiatrist and a newsreader, respectively. Niven plays a Nobel Prize-winning professor who suspects his wife, played by Lisi, of infidelity when she makes and unveils an 18-foot statue of him with private parts recognisably not his own. The film is based on the play called Chip, Chip, Chip by Alec Coppel.
Hello-Goodbye is a 1970 British comedy film starring Michael Crawford, and was the final film directed by Jean Negulesco.
She Couldn't Say No is a 1954 American rural comedy film starring Robert Mitchum, Jean Simmons and Arthur Hunnicutt. It was the last film in the long directing career of Lloyd Bacon to be released.
Whatever Works is a 2009 American comedy film directed and written by Woody Allen and starring Larry David, Evan Rachel Wood, Patricia Clarkson, Ed Begley Jr., Michael McKean, and Henry Cavill. It was released on June 19, 2009, received mixed reviews and grossed $35 million.
Affair with a Stranger is a 1953 American comedy-drama directed by Roy Rowland and starring Jean Simmons and Victor Mature. It was originally to be released as Kiss and Run.
Alvin Rakoff is a Canadian director of film, television and theatre productions. He has worked with actors including Laurence Olivier, Peter Sellers, Sean Connery, Judi Dench, Rex Harrison, Rod Steiger, Henry Fonda and Ava Gardner.
The Woman in the Fifth is a 2011 French-British-Polish drama film directed and written by Paweł Pawlikowski. Adapted from Douglas Kennedy's 2007 novel of the same name, the film centers on a divorced American writer who moves to Paris to be closer to his young daughter. As he embarks on an affair with a mysterious widow, a dark force seems to be taking control of his life.
Josef Shaftel was an American film producer, director and writer. He made a number of films in England.
Three Dangerous Ladies is a 1977 British-Canadian horror anthology film composed of three episodes of the six-part Harlech Television and The Ontario Educational Communications Authority co-produced series of half-hour television films titled Classics Dark and Dangerous. The three segments, Mrs. Amworth, The Mannikin and The Island, were directed, respectively, by Alvin Rakoff, Don Thompson, and Robert Fuest. The cast includes Glynis Johns, John Phillips, Ronee Blakley, Keir Dullea, John Hurt and Charles Gray.