Lunch Hour

Shirley Anne Field paints the designs for wallpaper. Robert Stephens is an executive at the company where she works. They fall in love, but between their jobs and their commutes to their homes, they have no opportunity to consummate their feelings.

It's based on a radio play by John Mortimer. Director James Hill opens it up with long, contemplative shots of where they work, where they lunch, on the street. Because of the source, there still is an enormous amount of talk, particularly in the climactic scene where they rent a room for an hour from hotelier Kay Walsh, and discuss the elaborate story Stephens has constructed to justify their short rendez-vous. As a movie it is charming but slight.

Shirley Anne Field is a young girl who gradually falls for her factory boss Robert Stephens - neither character are actually given names here! Their meetings are initially restricted to park chats or a visit to the tea room, which become gradually more frustrating as both wish to take their relationship to the next level. To that end he decides to procure an hotel room - and spins some fanciful yarns to the landlady along the way. What makes this otherwise rather procedural melodrama interesting is that the latter stages of the story increasingly see the young woman enter the realms of her imagination. What develops now for her is a family scenario with domestic bliss turning to domestic discord that though potent in it's intention is a little implausible. Not because she clearly has some form of schizophrenia, but because the man appears oblivious or uncaring to it - and that doesn't really sit with the basic premiss of the film, nor of their affection for each other. Their afternoon trysts would have surely demonstrated to him that she was ill and yet her fantasies proceed largely unfettered. There is, however, a strong dynamic between these two actors and peppered with only a few brief appearances from Kay Walsh running her den of iniquity, it is a strongly written and well presented two-hander that does offer food for thought.

Married Stephens fancies Field; can't keep his hands off her. With their trysts constantly blocked, he books a b&b in desperation.

Thing is, the yarns he contrives to fool the priggish early-60's types he meets on his odyssey to highly anticipated conquest are so fancy, she embroils herself in them.

Is she mad, or vigorously enjoying avoiding doing the deed ?

Being British, 'LH' stays relatively conservative, never veering into overblown 'Cat On A Hot Tin Roof' territory.

And again, being British, it's way ahead of the blunt U. S. in terms of feminism. There is no 'man holds all the cards until plucky woman finally trumps his hand' to be drudged through here . . she holds them all from the start !

From the days when seeing just one movie at the cinema was unthinkable, 'Lunch Hour' was presumably shot as a support feature - but written by John Mortimer and directed by James Hill, even a 'short' will have charm and intelligence if nothing else.

Field - captured by Wolfgang Suschitsky in soft, reverent b&w - is a jubilation. You can't blame Stephens for a second, but common sense should urge him think twice when secluded treasure shines as luminously as Shirley Anne.

Bryanston Films were responsible for numerous highly underrated British b-movies of the late 50s/early 60s and this one, at barely an hour in length, is up there with the best. The narrative is simple - a young salesman (Robert Stephens) in a wallpaper manufacturer, trapped in a seemingly loveless marriage, meets and is instantly attracted to a newly employed designer (Shirley-Anne Field) at the works. They want to get to know one another better but privacy is hard to find. So he books a room at a nearby private hotel for an hour one lunchtime....and there the fun (though not the way he intended) begins.

There are two ways of looking at what happens next - either she is, in reality, somewhat unhinged and her subsequent actions are the outpourings of a hysterical individual or, and I prefer this interpretation, she cleverly turns his (white) lies around, deciding that she is worth rather more than the occasional lunch hour fling.

Either way, the conclusion, with him, visibly rattled, returning to his desk whilst she, yards away, continues as nothing has happened is rather chilling.

Field is excellent throughout this film and it's not hard to see why she attracts most every male she encounters in her job. Stephens also excels as the naive, rather gauche individual who, whichever way you look at it, completely misreads the situation.

Definitely worth looking out for with the bonus of some great location shots and a very poignant soundtrack.

This is the sort of charming little film about the innocence of young love that couldn't be made today without copious love scenes to lure the 'punters' in.

It's also the type of film that nobody ever sees unless, like me, you scour the TV listings for obscure items and curios that are normally shown in the early hours of the morning, as this was, when the sort of innocent people that are portrayed in this film (if they still exist) are tucked up in bed and have been asleep for a good few hours.

This is the story of a young man and woman (Robert Stephens and Shirley Anne Field) who meet at the factory where they work and fall in love. Stephens plays an executive which is a job title that clearly flatters his position and Field plays an artist who having recently left art school paints flowers seemingly all day.

The short time they spend alone together is during lunch hours where they are constantly frustrated in their attempts to have a kiss and a cuddle. Stephens' character attempts to solve this problem by booking a hotel room and attempting to avoid suspicion by telling the landlady an assortment of lies. These include Field being his wife who has come down from the North with the kids (who will be looked after by an imaginary aunt) to discuss something very important.

Why he didn't book the same hotel room and use it overnight so they can really get down to the business at hand is never explained.

This is where the film goes really weird and Field's character starts to imagine the whole lie is actually true and visualises having to dealing with noisy crying kids and all the hassle that goes with it. Maybe this is her scary vision of the pressures of marriage and motherhood that will arise if she hangs around this executive chap much longer. Whatever the reason she comes across as an unhinged psycho who Stephens would do well to steer clear of.

It seems such a shame that Field's character goes from a lovely girl with whom any young man would want to spend their lunch hour to a hallucinating crackpot who probably belongs in a straitjacket. Then again you never truly know your beloved until you have spent an hour together in a grubby little hotel room.