Girl on Approval

James Maxwell and Rachel Roberts agree to foster 16-year-old Annette Whitely playing a 14-year-old. She's a nearly broken child; her mother abandoned her and is now in prison. Miss Whitely is a surly girl, adept at setting other people off, lying to set the adults against each other, and subject to fits of destructive temper. Maxwell and Miss Roberts find her a constant trial, and think they are failing her, not noticing her fondness for the dog and eventually their youngest son. It all comes to a head when Miss Whitely runs away.

It's an early offering in the British New Wave, offering a grueling glimpse into the problems of fostering children, even with the best of intentions and nearly boundless good will that frays under the constant barrage of stress. I came from a stable family, and I kept cringing at the well-written and performed outbursts. Director Charles Frend had begun at Ealing, where he directed the sentimental and heartfelt A RUN FOR YOUR MONEY; more recently he had fallen into the Bs and television work, but shows what he was still capable of with a good script and performers.

The film is interesting but unbalanced in two significant ways.Firstly there is the great performance of Rachel Roberts and the indifferent performance of Annette Whiteley.The second is the way in which they are portrayed.The foster parents are shown as being very sympathetic and the child is almost out of control.So it is difficult to accept that the family would want to keep her.What makes it worse is that she drives a wedge between husband and wife so that they end up rowing most of the time.The social worker keeps on encouraging the couple to keep the girl,now doubt secretly glad to have the girl off her hands.This is the sort of film that was more suited to television drama.Though worthy in intent it is rather too downbeat to entertain.

This film was pretty frank and honest for its time. It showed a young girl who was led to believe by her biological mother and the system that she was worthless and unloved. Therefore she acted out and pushed people away.

Rachel Roberts was excellent as always. The foster parents are shown being patient and tolerant, but everyone has their breaking point.

I feel this film was realistic and sympathetic towards all parties involved.

I won't give away the ending. You will just have to watch and find out. The sad part is I doubt things in the foster care system have improved much in 60 years. I am sure it is still difficult for all involved.

Viewing this film nowadays, a lot of it appears quite dated. However, the message it tries to put across is still valid to this very day. The story centres around foster parents taking a very troubled 14-year old girl into their home. The trials and tribulations that follow are maybe somewhat predictable, but also realistic and valid. That very fine actress, the ill-fated Rachel Roberts, delivers yet another excellent performance in the lead role as the foster mother. Good support is offered by James Maxwell as her husband. The only jarring note is provided by Annette Whiteley, as the problem child. Hers is a patchy performance and doesn't really satisfactorily convince, unfortunately. Overall the film is absorbing and generally well presented.

One of the key films of the British New Wave, an intimate, emotionally honest portrayal of s troubled, disenfranchised young teenaged girl, Sheila (Annete Whitely) a lonely, frequently ill-tempered teen, prone to exceedingly violent temper tantrums, her erratic behaviour proving to be a great strain on her kindly, if somewhat beleaguered foster parents, especially the foster mother Anne Howland (Rachel Roberts) who finds Sheila's lack of engagement, profound solitude, wildly vacillating moods, and uncommonly sour outlook on a hard-knock world that has thus far treated her so poorly almost too much to bear. Charles Frend's genuinely fascinating, Superbly acted, ahead-of-the-curve 'Kitchen Sink' drama is in many ways quite remarkable, while not as emotionally wrecking as Ken Loach's iconic 'Cathy Come Home', it is, perhaps, cut from the very same socially conscious celluloid, and is most certainly the progenitor of Mike Leigh's more trenchant works of uncompromisingly tough, politically engaged British cinema. 'Girl on Approval' remains a laudably frank look at the stark emotional turmoil of a traumatized teenaged girl desperately railing out at a confoundingly cold world she earnestly feels has completely rejected her, and the galvanically raw performance by the fearless Annete Whitely proved to be extremely moving, this adult, boldly unsentimental B/W melodrama comes highly recommended.