It Always Rains on Sunday

A rather splendid 1947 b/w film from the Ealing Studios. I find a lot of these films a little too sentimental and the acting a bit too stagey but this is a real surprise. Great dialogue, convincingly conveyed and together with super cinematography combine to make this a truly enjoyable if nostalgic view. The locations are more Camden than the East End, except for glimpses of Whitechapel at the start but no matter, it all looks good and the views of the railway marshalling yard at the end quite stunning. There is a central story but is is intercut with others and the whole thing bounces along nicely. Even the kids are all right and the amusing bits still amusing. Really though this is a very believable view of London's East End just after the war. Bomb sites, rationing and everyone trying to make the most of what they had. Also there was a feeling that the cops and robbers weren't really that different from each other, just on different sides and the important thing was to survive. Well worth a watch.

It is already listed but if you want to see the street where the family was "living" go to Hartland Road, just off Chalk Farm Road, just north of Camden Market. It is amazing how little has changed! (except the price of property!) It is odd to think that the street in which the film was set in such a period of shortages is now so close to such overt consumerism!

Also nice to note that is the fact that "Rose"- Googie Withers and "lover boy" John McCallum married each other for real in the year that the film was made and are still alive and married to each other today!

I wonder if films which are so "depressing" could be made today. Maybe the audience is just not there anymore. Conditions have improved since then and film-makers have to relate to their current audiences (usually under 25!)

The film was made and set in the bleak environment of post-war east London and shows Robert Hamer to be an extremely talented and sophisticated film maker. Unlike Dearden and Relph, Hamer does not impose a moral framework on his characters. The film shows two sides of adultery between Googie Withers and the escaped convict and between her daughter and a Jewish shopkeeper. What makes this film stand out is its intentioned 'realism' and complex character portrayals. This little known classic is probably one of Ealing's finest films.

Ealing Studios are chiefly remembered nowadays for their string of classic comedies made between 1946-55 but they also put out several notable pictures in other genres - including the justly celebrated horror portmanteau DEAD OF NIGHT (1945) - and this noir-ish melodrama is definitely one of their hidden gems. Although the plot per se is no great shakes - an escaped convict hides out in his by-now-married ex-flame's household - the idea was still fresh at the time and the film's marrying of the realistic and evocative recreation of daily life and surroundings (here being the seamier side of London's East End) with the exciting chase thriller format was much admired in its day and, in hindsight, very influential.

The good cast is headed by the formidable Googie Withers as the embittered housewife whose life of drab domesticity comes crashing down around her with the sudden reappearance of her lover (John McCallum, and Withers' own real-life husband-to-be) who demands food and shelter until he can skip the country; her much older, unassuming husband is played by frequent Norman Wisdom sidekick Edward Chapman and the pursuing police detective by the ubiquitous Jack Warner who cornered such roles in British films of the era, most notably in Basil Dearden's THE BLUE LAMP (1950); Chapman's three children are each having problems of their own and their frequent comings-and-goings in the house during this particular Sunday (the film is set all in one day) brings long-suppressed tensions to the fore.

Even without the eye-catching use of the medium of somebody like Carol Reed, the film is beautifully handled by the talented but ill-fated Robert Hamer - who, among other things, would later direct that which is undoubtedly Ealing's most famous comedy, KIND HEARTS AND CORONETS (1949) - and the climactic sequence (expertly lit, as always, by Douglas Slocombe) in which all the various strands of plot and secondary characters are seamlessly woven together is simply exquisite.

Optimum Releasing also included a featurette with film historian George Perry - who, incidentally, introduced THE BIG SLEEP (1946) at the recent National Film Theatre screening in London I attended; unfortunately, I encountered some playback problems on my Pioneer DVD player even before the start of the main feature but the R2 disc played without a hitch on my cheap HB model.

i have to disagree with the other reviewer. this a good, solid drama that captures the mood of post war london expertly. the stories mesh together well and the performances, with one notable exception, are first rate. the atmospheric photgraphy adds to the overall feel of the piece and the climax is very exciting.