Albert Finney, Shirley Anne Field, Rachel Roberts, Norman Rossington, Hylda Baker, Bryan Pringle
Genre:
Drama
Director:
Karel Reisz
Screenplay:
Alan Sillitoe from his novel
Cinematography:
Freddie Francis
Composer:
John Dankworth
“I’d like to see anybody try to grind me down. That’d be the day! What I’m out for is a good time; all the rest is propaganda” – Arthur Seaton
Brimming with self confidence and so contemptuous toward the rest of the world he doesn’t even fathom the potential of consequences or repercussions to his selfish and rebellious actions, working class hero/antihero Arthur Seaton (Albert Finney) represents the good and bad of unbridled raging masculinity trapped in a dead end job. A system battling non-conformist who lusts for freedom, Arthur sets out to challenge every rule, law, and form of authority, though he does so with spontaneous clumsiness. His heart is sometimes in the right place, but his attitude and juvenile tactics (he gets his kicks from stunts such as shooting a neighboring busybody housewife in the butt with a pellet gun) distance, if not alienate, him from even those who would like to be close to him. The film suitably walks the tightrope between presenting the optimism inherent to Arthur’s sureness in his system bucking methods and the reality that he makes his own world bleaker, not so much through his ideas (the movie generally supports his anti consumerist passivity and establishment ideas), but rather with his inept execution of them.
Arthur is a great character because rather than the shiftless type that had dominated the screen for decades, he’s at once a noble yet repulsive form of the ordinary young working man. Arthur represents the sort of person who believes they deserves better than a hopeless future of repetitive drudgery in a job that only presents the mental challenge of staying awake for another round, or in other words, every member of the working class. This disaffected young man only lives for the two days a week when he’s free, but drastically overcompensates by leading a reckless life, as he believes that’s the only way to avoid being reduced the level of his parents, two amongst the masses of programmed consumerist zombies who spend most of their free time vegetating in front of the latest rage, the boob tube.
In a sense, the actual hero of the film is Arthur’s cousin and best friend Bert (Norman Rossington). Though he’s never the focus, he shares the sentiments of the author Alan Sillitoe and filmmakers, showing how one can conduct their protests against all that’s wrong with the system without doing so in a harmful manner. Granted Bert is less apt to get a result than Arthur, but he’s at least far more apt to not get the result that Arthur always gets, a negative one.
Much of Arthur’s problem is his enjoyment centers around the use, if not abuse, of women and booze. Sex is one of the few things Arthur enjoys, but proves to be just as much of a trap as everything he wishes to evade. His older girlfriend Brenda (Rachel Roberts), wife of his boring sedated coworker friend Jack (Bryan Pringle) and mother of several, is not very attractive but willing to have rendezvous with him. As Arthur can’t be bothered taking any precautions to avoid pregnancy, he inevitably knocks her up, which is very troublesome considering she hadn’t had sex with her husband in a few months and abortion was illegal in the UK. The film is honest enough about the women’s predicament considering the censors wouldn’t even allow the word abortion to be uttered, but the general perspective is from the guy who knows he should take responsibility for raising the child but just can’t bring himself to man up, and would like to pay to be rid of the fetus but can’t afford the 40 quid necessary to get it taken care of on the sly.
Brenda’s counterpart is the lovely young virgin Doreen (Shirley Ann Field). She’s a nice girl who is already a bit dull. The problem for Arthur is she’s a proper woman, which means she’s not going to be deflowered without getting a wedding ring and a house with a toilet inside in exchange. Both women are traps in their own way, but after two cadets double team Arthur for his infractions involving Brenda, he begins to come around to the possibility of a livable marriage to Doreen.
One of Doreen’s good points is though she will point out that Arthur’s aimlessly lashing out, she accepts that he’ll do so from time to time. Arthur will have to do something more productive with his paycheck than chug it down, but he’s so arrogant he may just con himself into believing he can remain true to his rebellious nature despite some domestication. This ending is far too pat and conventional, pretending to offer hope so as to end on a positive note despite actually impaling the soul of the main character. Most people do end up like their parents, but such an immediate change toward that course is nonetheless a highly disappointing conclusion, especially considering there had hardly been an unbelievable note up to the final segment.
Saturday Night and Sunday Morning is the first feature of British Free Cinema pioneer Karel Reisz. Reisz’ documentary background proves invaluable to the credibility of the film, as rather than the usual stagebound pretty boy costume party, he brings a few fresh actors into the working class milieu populated by people who actually know what it’s like to get their hands dirty. Apart from one artsy scene at the amusement park, the naturally lit industrial town atmosphere brought forth by shooting in and around actual Nottingham factories, pubs, and streams is so authentic that at the time you could probably forget you weren’t watching a documentary (now we see Finney as a luminary, but this was actually his first starring role). The film that once shocked audiences with it’s frankness and grittiness is no longer jolting, but now serves as an excellent time capsule of late 1950’s British working class life.
