While she had been around on stage and screen for well over a decade, the gorgeous Anne Bancroft hadn't made much of an impression, that is until she won the Oscar for her intense performance in "The Miracle Worker". Becoming known for her strong, determined women, she rarely played anyone fragile. However, in this British art house film, she played a delicate flower who turns into a Venus flytrap when pushed to the edge.
Newly married to the alternately tender and brutal Peter Finch, she's unaware at first of his resentment of her previous marriages and the children from those relationships. She discovers through very subtle hints how much he secretly both adores her and hates her, that his infidelities have been pretty much right under her nose, and that they have been with women she felt she considered friends. In short, he is the one with the serious psychiatric issues, and like Charles Boyer to Ingrid Bergman, he has been gaslighting their entire relationship.
This is one of those complicated adult dramas that explores the best and worst of adult relationships, showing humanity at its most vile. A key early scene has Bancroft meeting the troubled Maggie Smith who bolts in and out of her life at a huge speed, leaving behind chaos as details come forward about what was going on between Smith and Finch. Then there's a cameo by Sir Cedric Hardwicke as Bancroft's imperious father, reminding me of the father and daughter relationship in "The Barretts of Wimpole Street".
A scene with Bancroft having a breakdown while shopping and another one with Bancroft in a hair dressers shop (being badgered by an obvious troubled man hating customer) are key in showing Bancroft's desperation and fragile nature. James Mason comes on as an associate of Finch's in a party scene, showing more issues behind the marriage, especially when he makes a very strange call to Bancroft while she's visited by a stranger claiming to be the new king kg Israel. Alternately strange and troubling, this is often perplexing, but as a Bergman themed drama of the complex human condition, it will leave the viewer thinking. It's also ironic how much Bancroft resembles Joan Crawford at times, considering that just the year before, Crawford accepted Bancroft's Oscar for her and that Bancroft was offered the leading role in "Mommie Dearest".
Newly married to the alternately tender and brutal Peter Finch, she's unaware at first of his resentment of her previous marriages and the children from those relationships. She discovers through very subtle hints how much he secretly both adores her and hates her, that his infidelities have been pretty much right under her nose, and that they have been with women she felt she considered friends. In short, he is the one with the serious psychiatric issues, and like Charles Boyer to Ingrid Bergman, he has been gaslighting their entire relationship.
This is one of those complicated adult dramas that explores the best and worst of adult relationships, showing humanity at its most vile. A key early scene has Bancroft meeting the troubled Maggie Smith who bolts in and out of her life at a huge speed, leaving behind chaos as details come forward about what was going on between Smith and Finch. Then there's a cameo by Sir Cedric Hardwicke as Bancroft's imperious father, reminding me of the father and daughter relationship in "The Barretts of Wimpole Street".
A scene with Bancroft having a breakdown while shopping and another one with Bancroft in a hair dressers shop (being badgered by an obvious troubled man hating customer) are key in showing Bancroft's desperation and fragile nature. James Mason comes on as an associate of Finch's in a party scene, showing more issues behind the marriage, especially when he makes a very strange call to Bancroft while she's visited by a stranger claiming to be the new king kg Israel. Alternately strange and troubling, this is often perplexing, but as a Bergman themed drama of the complex human condition, it will leave the viewer thinking. It's also ironic how much Bancroft resembles Joan Crawford at times, considering that just the year before, Crawford accepted Bancroft's Oscar for her and that Bancroft was offered the leading role in "Mommie Dearest".