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Vincent Canby of The New York Times called The Whales of August "a cinema event." His generosity is understandable, given the film's main draw:two of the greatest actresses in movie history, whose careers extend back to the very beginnings of narrative. They are Lillian Gish and Bette Davis, and they are two of cinema's lovely, essential people... so it is painful to report that Mr. Canby's gallant review is not really justified by this trifle, a once-round-the-Golden Pond-lightly. Demanding Bette and dutiful Lillian are sisters living on the Maine coast; Vincent Price is a courtly suitor, and Ann Sothern and Harry Carey Jr. (the liveliest performers in the picture) are local folk. Directed by a great student of film, Lindsay Anderson (O Lucky Man!), the material is fatally soppy. In truth, this isn't a movie, it's a shrine to two giants in winter--well-intended, and best seen as a tribute. --Robert Horton ... Read more

Reviews (11)

A "Whale" Of A Movie
What a wonderful movie. I wish they would make it in a DVD. Five
talented veterans of the silver (and I do mean "silver") screen
all together in a beautiful story of golden ages and golden memories. Bette Davis, Lillian Gish, Ann Sothern, Vincent Price
and Harry Carey Jr. are a joy to watch. I've watched this film
so many times I think I know all the lines, but I never tire of it. Five stars aren't enough to rate such stellar performances.

A MOVIE EVENT!
A gorgeous movie to watch and own. What more can you say about a movie with Bette Davis, Lillian Gish, Ann Sothern and Vicent Price in it? A film that brings talent, beautiful scenery and a great story line together to make an "epic picture" and puts it into a 91 minute treasure.

LEGENDS TO THE END
Watching this film after several years was something of a bitterwsweet experience - it looks wonderful on DVD - it's beautifully photographed and has a subtle, haunting musical score. But its reason for being is as the final showcase for the acting of two screen legends to whom everyone in Hollywood today owes their careers - Lillian Gish, who invented screen acting during the silent era, and Bette Davis, who reinvented it after sound came in. "Life fools you," Davis says in the film, and she could have been referring to herself - it's hard to believe this is the Bette Davis of JEZEBEL and DARK VICTORY, of THE LITTLE FOXES, NOW VOYAGER, and ALL ABOUT EVE, even of WHAT EVER HAPPENED TO BABY JANE? Age, illness and, yes, life - had taken their toll on her. But, she has her moments here - oddly enough, her best are without dialog, such as when she brushes a lock of her dead husbands hair across her cheek, while Gish has the lovely "passion and truth" monologue. Ah well - they don't make 'em like these gals anymore!

top movie
You need to be an adult to enjoy this movie. Betti Davis is just great. The film it self is just beautiful and Lilian Gish is fantastic. The ocean is very pretty and their home is great. I have only owned it a little over a month and I have watched it already three times. I truly love Betti Davis and even though she is really old in this movie she still is great.

Buy it, you will enjoy it.

One of my favorite films
When I watched this as a young man of 20 I fell in love with it. It is not an action film. It is a beautiful story of deep characters as they find themselves having become old. It is a story of reclaiming yourself, even at the end of your days.

It is one of the last films of Bette Davis and Vincent Price. They gave magnificent performances that I still treasure. I have waited a long time for this to come on DVD!! One of my favorite quotes is from Bette Davis. She was told by her sister that "Memories fade with time." Bette, portraying her blind sister, proudly proclaims in her best Bette Davisness - "That has not been my experience!" ... Read more

Description

This simultaneously heartbreaking and hilarious play, from Booker Prize-winning author David Storey, follows the interaction of five patients over the course of a single afternoon in the garden of what we can fairly assume is an English mental hospital. A classic pairing of two of the world's greatest English-speaking actors. Directed by Lindsay Anderson. Music by Alan Price. "...the most slickly produced drama yet seen on television." --The New York Times. With Sir John Gielgud, Sir Ralph Richardson, Dandy Nichols, Mona Washbourne, and Warren Clarke. ... Read more

Amazon.com

Prolific British filmmaker Lindsay Anderson weaves this small, evocative tale of young life at the crossroads in early 1960s Northern England. A rough, sullen young man (Richard Harris) working in the local coal mines begins to make a name for himself as a star rugby player, but even as he begins to fall in love he cannot escape the harsh realities of the bleak life around him. The rugby sequences in the film are striking, but no more so than the depiction of downtrodden people living in the shadow of industry and corruption that too often crushes their spirit. Harris in one of his first roles, is remarkably effective as an unlikable but sympathetic figure trying against hope to savor the small joys life has to offer, and the film also features the debut of renowned actress Glenda Jackson. One of a series of working-class, character-driven British imports, This Sporting Life is one of the best on the field. --Robert Lane ... Read more

Reviews (7)

Powerful English drama
This drama offers a gripping story and outstanding performances. The affair between a frigid widow and a professional rugby player who carries the violence of the football field into his personal life is painfully detailed and will have you captivated throughout the whole film.
A powerful film characteristic of the British dramas of the 50’s and 60’s based on working class life in rural England. Director Lindsay Anderson is one of the major contributors to this genre.

Stark, but compelling - A working class masterpiece
The greatest sports movie ever made. The story of a miner in Yorkshire using his sporting skill in an attempt to escape the harshness of the industrial north east of the mid sixties.
This great sport, Rugby League, was born of the toughness and physicality that these hard men faced in their everyday lives.

Richard Harris is brilliant in the lead role of Frank Machin, and the Rugby League scenes are the most realistic portrayal of sport ever bought to the screen.

A true masterpiece and a snapshot of the cruel realities that shape other peoples lives.

An essential addition to every serious collector of dramatic sports cinema.

Harris' Finest Performance
While viewing this film again recently, I was curious to see if it has lost any of its edge since I first saw it almost 40 years ago. It hasn't. In fact, in light of almost daily revelations of inappropriate (if not illegal) conduct by professional and even by so-called amateur athletes, it has perhaps even more relevance today. In my opinion, Richard Harris (Frank Machin) delivers his finest performance as a coal miner in Northern England (Yorkshire) who gains fame and fortune as a professional rugby player. I am reminded of Scorcese and De Niro's presentation of Jake La Motta in Raging Bull. (Both athletes fail in their personal relationships for precisely the same reasons they succeed in competition.) Rachel Roberts plays Mrs. Hammond, the only person Machin sincerely cares about, other than himself. Most of the time, she endures his use and abuse of her but in one memorable scene, she confronts him as the arrogant bully he is. He appreciates her only after....

David Storey wrote the screenplay based on his novel (same title) and, under Lindsay Anderson's crisp and sure direction, each member of the cast delivers a superb performance, including Glenda Jackson in what I think is her debut role. The colorful, often violent action on various playing fields is effectively portrayed, in stunning contrast with the drab lives of those who cheer on the teams. Credit Denys Coop for the cinematography. In essence, this film explores the nature and extent of one man's raw ambition and almost animalistic determination as his natural talents enable him to seize opportunities available to few others. Comparisons of This Sporting Life with Raging Bull are not a stretch. (Presumably De Niro saw this film prior to portraying La Motta. Did Harris see Brando in On the Waterfront before portraying Machin?) This is a dark film in terms of its tone and setting; also in terms of what it reveals about the values of young men such as Machin whose fame and fortune can be gone so quickly, and often unexpectedly. Then what? Within its own self-imposed limits, this is a "classic" film.

A British Masterpiece of the 1960s
This masterpiece by Lindsay Anderson should be on any film aficionado's must-see list. It is an uncompromising study of alienation, social class, maturity, and loneliness. Richard Harris gives a performance of astonishing realism: it seems unlikely he could ever surpass it. The character moves from physicalized anger to tenderness often within a moment. Harris builds to a completely believable dramatic eruption by the climax. He is matched all along the way by Rachel Roberts, a great actress in an unforgettable role: a woman unwilling to let go of the past and the pain it contains.

Anderson populates the film with several other memorable characters--an older man who seems to be in love with the hero, the grasping team-owner's wife who wishes to possess him.

The film contains scenes of nearly unbearable intensity and anguish (Frank's drunken ballad sung in a bar, or Margaret's pleading to be left alone). Also of note is the film's unusual structure, functioning on two levels at once: in "real time" and in Frank's memory, which he may be coloring by his own reactions (something for the viewer to contemplate).

The black and white cinematography is often beautiful as it poeticizes Frank's plight (for example, near the end of the film, he ends up wandering along moonlit railway tracks in a world of steely, silvery loneliness. Also of note, the wonderfully nightmarish music by Roberto Gerhard, an avant-garde composer who differed with the director on the scoring the film.

See the film on DVD for maximum quality. Although the disc contains no special features, it is good to know this great picture has been preserved in the new medium.

Hard
Richard Harris uses all his knowledge and love of rugby football in his award nominated role. If the footballing parts of this movie are not for the faint hearted, then neither is the harsh look at life in north of England. This is no romantic comedy but the best film of it's genre. A classic of 1960's British movies! ... Read more

Reviews (4)

Stand alone, I'm not sure
I'm sorry. I can't be satisfied after "O Lucky Man!". It is bias, I know, but I just can't be satisfied. It probably is a great film in it's own right, but I don't think a perfect ending. When I watched it, I was overcome by a sense of finality. Originally, I wanted to see the late Leonard Rossiter(The Fall and Rise of Reginald Perrin) in a starring role. I found out that it was a third part of a trilogy I was only dimly aware of. I think that it is now hard to watch as anything but an end of a trilogy("If...", "O Lucky Man!", and "Britannia Hospital"). It is a strange film. And it has beautiful moments. Like the girl offering a flower to the riot squad policeman. It is a very loose end to the trilogy, but a stark statement of itself. Like the others, a definite statement about the future is open. That makes it more enjoyable. Crowden is very creepy and so so positive as Prof. Miller. There are some interesting cameos as well. Watch what happens to Mark Hamill(Luke Skywalker). Anderson ended this trilogy of movies on a realistic, but bleak note. What becomes of Travis is just a side note. The card with the original poster is great. I have made people watch this by itself, but I still suggest watching all of it together.

Anderson takes on British hospitals.
It's no ordinary day for Britannia Hospital. Today is the 500th anniversary of its founding and after a gala luncheon, HRH herself is planning a royal visit to officially open the new wing. Yet beneath the facade of its glorious name, the place isn't a nice place to be, as seen in the opening. A terminal pulmonary case is brought in on stretcher. The three ER personnel on duty go off on their tea break, and the man dies on the stretcher.

Complications arise from a differing number of fronts. The cooking staff under Ben Keating have gone on strike, protesting the unequal treatment between ordinary patients and the privileged private patients. The latter can get eggs benedict and champagne, deviled kidney and passionfruit, and in the case of the President of Kenya, Ngami, accused of Idi Amin-like human rights abuses, trout grilled and garnished with mango slices. Keating says, "This isn't the Nairobi Hilton. This is a British hospital. It's the same for everyone or nothing at all."

The hospital is expecting 150 people injured by a bomb attack, presumably IRA (it's unmentioned), and even the ER personnel are making salary demands. It's a wonder Vincent Potter, the hospital's chief administrator, doesn't crack up. He has a heck of a time juggling crisis after crisis, even from the two royal peers, one being Sir Anthony Mount, a midget, the other Lady Ramsden (played by a man(!))

Also, outside the hospital gates, a group of demonstrators, waving placards are protesting the privileged private patients but there are also some Africans who are howling for Ngami's blood. Then there's Mick Travers, played for the third time by Malcolm McDowell. An investigative journalist this time around, he infiltrates the hospital to find out about Dr. Millar's unorthodox surgical experiments.

Dr. Millar, an eccentric character specializing in high-tech transplant surgery, talks about a secret project, at one point saying, "Have you ever wondered how God felt on the sixth day of creation?" and "Today, the human experiment. Tomorrow, Genesis!"
And just what is that black pyramid of his? His speech at the movie's end is very timely and well worth the wait.

These subplots are like icebergs slowly floating towards each other until... CRASH!

Many famous faces appear here. Joan Plowright as Ms. Grimshaw, Fulton MacKay as Chief Superintendent Johns, Peter Jeffrey as Sir Geoffrey Brownhurst, and Leonard Rossiter as Vincent Potter. Robin Askwith, after cutting his teeth on Pete Walker films, really gets a great supporting role as the coarse, working-class Ben Keating. And Mark Hamill has a small role as Mick's helper Red, who spends most of the time being stoned.

Britannia Hospital is the third in Lindsay Anderson's Mick Travers trilogy, the first two being if... and O Lucky Man. Hospital care has really gone down the tubes, as seen here, and it's the cause of rich versus poor, and how those on top try to keep those on the bottom in line by saying "...working men and women will always put unity before anarchy, royalty before self, and common sense before disruptive strife." Well, those words can only go so far.

Brilliant!!!
Britannia Hospital, an allegory for what was transpiring in England at the time, was released in 1982, and is the final part of Lindsay Anderson' brilliant trilogy of films that follow the adventures of Mick Travers as he travels through a strange and sometimes surreal Britain. From his days at boarding school in If.... (1968) to his journey from coffee salesman to film star in O'Lucky Man (1972), Travers' adventures finally come to an end in Britannia Hospital. Mick is now an investigative reporter, and is investigating the bizzarre activities of Professor Miller, played by the always interesting Graham Crowden, whom he had had a run in with in O'Lucky Man. Checkout the Pig Man scene. This is well before Seinfeld.

The events in Britannia Hospital take place over tyhe course of a day. The hospital administration, headed by the perpetually agitated Mr Potter, performed with great aplomb by Leonard Rossiter, prepares for the arrival of a royal visitor (a Queen Mum type figure) to open its new ultra modern Miller wing. His job is not made easy due to the fact that the majority of the staff are out on strike. the union, lead by Ben Keating, is causing waves. And that Professor Miller is conducting bizzarre scientific experiments. Checkout the scene where Miller eats a piece of human brain, after cutting it in half and liquefying it in a blender. A nutricious drink, no less.

Amongst all this mayhem, there is a full scale riot later on, Travers tries to get the goods on Miller. With the assistance of Nurse Persil, played by Marsha Hunt, stiffy inducing in her tight uniform, and Red and Sammy, played by Mark (Star Wars) Hamill and Frank Grimes respectively, both of whom end up getting stoned out of their brains on a cocktail of drugs, Mick infiltrates the Miller wing and soon finds himself witnessing, and unwittinglly participating in, one of Miller's outragous experiments.

Meanwhile, chaos ensures as Britannia Hospital runs out of control and all of Potters plans are sent awry. He is even forced to resort to commit murder.

As is usual with an Anderson film the acting, by a top notch cast, most of whom had been in the previous two, is uniformly good. It is professionally shot by Mike Fash, although his work doesn't have the same feel to it that Miroslav Ondricek brought to the proceeding istalments, and is well produced.

All three films have recurring characters from each. Some of the charaters from If...., that didn't turn up in O'Lucky Man, returned for Britannia Hospital. The film was lambasted by the English critics on release, with one actually comparing it to a carry on film??? Yet, this wasn't wholly unexpected, as the other two weren't exactly welcomed with open arms, more so O'Lucky Man than If....

All three films are skillfully written by david Sherwin, with O'Lucky Man being based on an idea by Malcolm McDowell., who plays Mick travers in all of them.

From its opening scene where an elderly patient is left to die on a gurney to its final revalatory scene of Miller unvailing his greatest scientific achievement, the film is choc full of surprises. One character is played by a dwarf and another by a man in drag. Yet one of the more pleasant surprises is the performance of Robin Askwith as Ben Keating, the school bully from If...., Askwith' film debut. Keating has organised a strike by the kitchen staff in retaliation for Potter ordering sixty-five ambassador class lunches from Furtnum's. Askwith handles his role with skill, making Keating quite a likable character. It just goes to show what a good director and good dialogue can achieve. It is certainly a far cry from his sex film days. And it is good to see what he is capable of, given the chance. Unfortunately, it was all a bit too late, and after appearing in two seasons of the telly series the Bottle Boys, he slipped into obscurity, doing panto and clubs, only to reappear sixteen years later in Eastenders.

Britannia Hospital also proved to be one of the last decent films Malcolm McDowell was to appear in. The British film industry was in dire trouble by this time. Arab oil money had dried up and the Americans were pulling out. Also, the notorious film Caligula, which McDowell had filmed back in 1977, had recently been released to universal outrage, combined together, this put the kybosh on his career in England. However, he didn't fair any better in the states, where he had moved to after making Time After Time (1979). And his career since then has been an almost endless stream of B-grade drivel.

Over the years Britannia Hospital, as with the other two, has been reivaluated and is now considered another classic from the Anderson stable. I could have told them this when I first saw it back in '82.

Trivia:

*McDowell didn't take a fee for the film as a favour to Anderson, due to the fact the budget was so low.

*Alan Bates plays a patient who is murdered by Miller, so he can use his head in his latest experiment.

This was Arthur Lowe's last fim. He died not long after the film came out.

So put a day aside, grab If...., O'Lucky Man and Britannia Hospital and take an epic journey into the humorously dark and surreal world of Lindsay Anderson. There will never be another.

Disappointing sequel to "If..." and "O Lucky man"
A reporter (McDowell)investigates the chaos of a strike-bound hospital, only to find himself falling victim to the ghastly experiments of a demented surgeon (Crowden). After the measured excesses of "if.." and "O Lucky Man" this film makes a course for the cheapest laugh, failing to entertain along the way. The sense of parody in the first two films was always off-beat, and the better for it, but "Brittania Hospital" misses the target altogether. ... Read more

Reviews (22)

Where O Where is the DVD?
Simply put, one of the most fascinating films of the 70s with an outstanding soundtrack. An absolute one-of-a-kind movie and I can't understand why it's still not on DVD. Who owns the rights to this film?WHERE IS THE DVD?

lucky to say the least
I recently watched O Lucky Man again with a friend who was watching it for the first time, and I became accutely aware of the feelings I had when I first watched it.It was an exhilarating and inspirational experience.I envied my friend for a moment and then I got back to the picture...and I realized how much better this movie gets after repeated viewings.Wow!

But as so many have said here in these reviews, a DVD release (Criterion are YOU listening??) packed with extras is sooooo overdue.I've only ever seen this film on vhs and I'm salivating at the thought of seeing it on DVD...

It'll be like watching it for the first time...

O Lucky Viewers
Everytime I see pictures of the flemish painter Heironymous Bosch and then see Lindsey Anderson in this movie I think, gee he looks just like Bosch; kinda makes movies like Bosch paints as well.His loosely connected Mick Travis trilogy: if.., O' Lucky Man and Britannia Hospital often look like the typical Bosch tryptich, in which the left panel shows man's expulsion from a distorted forboding man's view of "heaven"; in if..'s case a British authoritarian boarding school, while the right side of Bosch's tryptichs show the twisted tortuous hell that man merits from his sins on earth; in Britannia Hospital's case, an insane asylum diguised as a government run hospital where death is certain from the most disgustingly violent experiments and sponsered by bureaucratic sadists.In the middle of these moralty paintings is the incendiary display of sins man commits.And it is here that we often find the most engaging bits of Bosch's work where so much happens in an instant as viewing a painting, which, actually takes years to see it all.O' Lucky Man is very much designed in this fashion even if it wasn't intentional.We get elements from this movie that may never be fully realized again in film; a dismal prospect indeed. Innovations actually abound with this revolutionary film.We have it's soundrack and score composer not only effectively weigh commentary on the movie's long suffering but affably earnest protagonist Travis (played with astonishing exuberence and charm by Malcolm McDowell), but that the singer (Alan Price, formerly of the Animals) even interacts with him in the film.As innovative and amusing as that technique was, the soundrack can still stand on it's own as one of the greatest and most relevant to a film plot ever written.Tell anyone who goes on a job interview or for that matter, hates their job to listen to the world weary idiosyncratic bliss in the song Poor People, a song that sticks forever in the souls of those who loved this movie like honey melting on hot toast crumpets. All in all, a very touching ode to smiling down disaster.
Many may twitch at the seemingly overindulgent symbolism going on and the lengthy running time and disjointed feel of this epic.They may also get confused by the hilarious running gag of the actors playing repeated roles.I found it fun beyond a roll in the hay to catch when each player shows up again and again several times over then bust out in laughter when Travis actually recognizes the lusciously charming Helen Mirren groupie character Patricia who showed up in episodes before his stint in jail, then looking at her talent agency clerk character with puzzling bewilderment a few moments later as if he had no clue.As Mick, Malcolm McDowell can come off as enthusiastic and gullible then believably struggle with frustration, cynicism, and finally dogged determination to be "good" then giving up only to be thwacked back into his trademark grin.The writing is all over his vastly expressive face and makes this one of his most unforgettable portrayals, completly abscent is the casual sadism that has garnered him praise but unfortunate typecasting down the road.This is a must see movie for fans of his villian work who want to see his range; simply brilliant work.
It is also a film that is astonishingly relevant to how capitalist societies still function.We're often amazed at how we havn't changed much from our need to divest in our homeland to rape another for the needs of the selfish.Granted the film is long and bitingly sardonic and perhaps that idealism causes a slower decay then Anderson might have imagined.Still, many of the films relevant lines about dying like dogs, radio commentary on Zen and revolution being the opium of intellectuals ring strong in the hearts of anyone who questions their existence and worth in the world.This seems to be the one true everyman type of film as surreal as it may be.There is just something so satisfying in just hearing the characters walking, which sounds strikingly like marching.And it happens almost everytime before our poor boy Travis gets a beating.It is a movie that has to be seen and heard repeatedly. Defintely buy this film.For anyone who cares, if you managed to tape the uncut British version of the film when it ran on some obscure cable stations back in the early 90s, you may have gold in your hands; the deleted 'My Home Town' suicide sequence is there.Yes, like a Boscsh picture, there is so much to see in this gem and we are all the luckier for having it in our lives.

YEAH
I give this movie 5 stars because they just don't make 'em like this anymore. Also, when I read comments where folks bash the 70's, I simply wonder,I mean WONDER-what are they comparing the 1970's to??? Today? WHAT? You have got to be kidding? O Lucky Man is a journeyman movie built with the rambling sober style so popular at the time. The soundtrack I found irritating BUT it's still classic and really the movie wouldn't be the same without it. Some of the images and scenes in this movie are simply in the very top of movie ideas, the very top. See this movie. And as far as dated, it is dated compared to Survivor, The Apprentice, Friends, The Reality Show, ad nauseum and all the rest of the Nothing Zone we call today's digital media culture offerings. Blah! Give me the ole rusty 70's any day of the week!

O Lucky DVD
All films of the 70s deserve to be seen in DVD instead of the antiquated VHS technolgy. What a joke... a friend once said that it should have been illegal for anything to have been designed in the 70s. Both he and I exempt O Lucky Man. What a great cinematic experience. I still remember the theatre I saw it in. Alan Price's music... still relevant, still great. Are you listening, Wes Anderson? Where have you gone Lindsay Anderson? Please come back with your film on DVD. ... Read more