Recently shown in all its sleazy glory on BBC 's British B season, this leans heavily on the Hollywood classic THE POSTMAN ALWAYS RINGS TWICE - indeed Sandra Dore's character would aspire to the glamour of a Lana Turner. It follows the template of the hot sexy young wife using her hunky but dumb young stud to eliminate her inconvenient older husband but adds a few ingredients of its own. Marilyn tends be too whiny to be sympathetic and Maxwell Reed (a pin-up of his day) manages to convey the fall-guy mechanic's infatuation and confusion as his lover increasingly takes him for granted. The film throws in the added complication of the character of Rose who nurtures unrequited lesbian feelings for Marilyn but the actress's reading of her lines is monotonous and unfeeling - trying to be downtrodden, she merely comes across as vacuous and a bad actress. An unrecognisably young Ferdy Mayne crops up as a sleazy, flashy hustler who woos Marilyn with promises of the high life but skedaddles when she grows too serious. Best actor is Leslie Dwyer = Mr Partridge himself - as the cuckolded hubbie who comes to a predictable end. British B films ended to reflect the seedy down-at-heels side of England - mostly because they couldn't afford to gloss things up. In a way, they paved the way for the kitchen sink films of the late 5's- early 60's. However, they lacked actors who looked the part like Albert Finney and Tom Courtney. They had to settle for Maxwell Reed. Dwyer looks the part and inhabits his character more convincingly than the others.
15 Reviews
Uses "The Postman always rings twice & Rebecca" in its plot
howardmorley20 August 2018
I saw this today Monday 20/8/18 on "Talking Pictures" channel 81 for the first time.Elements of the captioned well known films were used in its plot line and.In place of John Garfield we have Maxwell Reed giving his eyebrowns another workout.In place of June Anderson (Mrs Danvers) from Rebecca we have the character of Rosie, with lesbian longings for Sandra Dorn which of course could not be shown on screen in 1953 only suggested.The points made by other reviewers were valid but the final scene of police cars drawing up to a stop at the petrol station indicated the producers were short of the funds to finish the film and /or didn't know how to give it a satisfactory ending.This may account for its mediocre rating by reviewers just over 5 whereas I awarded it 6.
The Mechanic Always Rings Twice
Leofwine_draca24 August 2016
This low budget British film is a version of THE POSTMAN ALWAYS RINGS TWICE, about adultery, passion, a love triangle, and murder, all set around that most British of locations, an independent garage. An interesting cast go through the motions here although it's fair to say that the constraints of the budget mean that the film never really excites or innovates and instead sort of just plods along.
It doesn't help that we've seen this age-old story play out time and again. Maxwell Reed (BLACKOUT) is the heartthrob hero, a drifter who finds employment at the hands of a bad-tempered mechanic (Leslie Dwyer, great but underutilised in a character role). He soon falls for the comely charms of Dwyer's wife, Sandra Dorne, who is a Diana Dors-alike and not a bad actress at all. You can guess the rest of the story, but fun is added from Ferdy Mayne's stalwart suitor and the chance to see Kenneth Connor in a bit part. Although MARILYN is entirely devoid of originality, it's a relatively watchable little piece with plenty of character work going on.
It doesn't help that we've seen this age-old story play out time and again. Maxwell Reed (BLACKOUT) is the heartthrob hero, a drifter who finds employment at the hands of a bad-tempered mechanic (Leslie Dwyer, great but underutilised in a character role). He soon falls for the comely charms of Dwyer's wife, Sandra Dorne, who is a Diana Dors-alike and not a bad actress at all. You can guess the rest of the story, but fun is added from Ferdy Mayne's stalwart suitor and the chance to see Kenneth Connor in a bit part. Although MARILYN is entirely devoid of originality, it's a relatively watchable little piece with plenty of character work going on.
If you keep on doing it you'll go to hell.
fillherupjacko11 December 2008
Warning: Spoilers
This is a film made for post-war austerity Britain's female cinema-goers. Its opening credits, featuring a shot of London Road, representing, for Marilyn (Sandra Dorne) the road out of drabness and rationing and everything closed and cold on a Sunday - just as they sit in the cinema and enjoy an hour's escape of wish fulfilment.
Marilyn mirrors the hopes of the female audience in that the road will lead to a bit of life and glamour. Anything would be better than old hubby George (Leslie Dwyer) and his garage/ café.
We see Marilyn dancing about in her husband's dismal road side café to American big band music on the jukebox ("bloody row"). Her body, almost trying to break free of the shackles of 50s clothes, only prompts her husband to say: "You'll catch your death of cold."
George can't understand her and resents her wanting something better. But what is there to be had anyway in 50s Britain? "I've given you all the comforts. A gas-fire in every room and electric light!" Humiliatingly, she can't even leave him and return to Dad as hubby has hired her from him in a bizarre arrangement. "£2 a week."
Marilyn's life changes when mechanic, Tom (Maxwell Reed) is hired. "I'm the new man", he tells her. I bet!
Tom's dialogue is full of ambiguous lines like: "Do you want me to light the fire?" When Marilyn first sees him, he's standing under a sign that says "lubrication service." Blimey!
Rosie, a retarded lesbian seemingly besotted with Marilyn is, conversely, the only character who talks any sense. Not that Marilyn is the sort of girl to take advice. All she wants to do is escape - in any way she can.
Music takes her away. The night of her affair with Tom is almost the real end of the film. "We'll go on pretending."
Everything after this is just fantasy: killing her husband; Everton turning up on the scene (not the Walton white socks but Nicky Everton played by Ferdy Mayne) and converting ex hubby's old pull-in into the sort of American style diner so improbable that you half expect to see Burt Lancaster and Ava Gardner sitting in the corner sipping pre-mixed cocktails. It's packed to the rafters every night and the cloth-capped lorry drivers have been replaced by jitterbugging couples. Where have all these people come from?
Marilyn mirrors the hopes of the female audience in that the road will lead to a bit of life and glamour. Anything would be better than old hubby George (Leslie Dwyer) and his garage/ café.
We see Marilyn dancing about in her husband's dismal road side café to American big band music on the jukebox ("bloody row"). Her body, almost trying to break free of the shackles of 50s clothes, only prompts her husband to say: "You'll catch your death of cold."
George can't understand her and resents her wanting something better. But what is there to be had anyway in 50s Britain? "I've given you all the comforts. A gas-fire in every room and electric light!" Humiliatingly, she can't even leave him and return to Dad as hubby has hired her from him in a bizarre arrangement. "£2 a week."
Marilyn's life changes when mechanic, Tom (Maxwell Reed) is hired. "I'm the new man", he tells her. I bet!
Tom's dialogue is full of ambiguous lines like: "Do you want me to light the fire?" When Marilyn first sees him, he's standing under a sign that says "lubrication service." Blimey!
Rosie, a retarded lesbian seemingly besotted with Marilyn is, conversely, the only character who talks any sense. Not that Marilyn is the sort of girl to take advice. All she wants to do is escape - in any way she can.
Music takes her away. The night of her affair with Tom is almost the real end of the film. "We'll go on pretending."
Everything after this is just fantasy: killing her husband; Everton turning up on the scene (not the Walton white socks but Nicky Everton played by Ferdy Mayne) and converting ex hubby's old pull-in into the sort of American style diner so improbable that you half expect to see Burt Lancaster and Ava Gardner sitting in the corner sipping pre-mixed cocktails. It's packed to the rafters every night and the cloth-capped lorry drivers have been replaced by jitterbugging couples. Where have all these people come from?
The Postman Only Rang Once
mls418227 July 2020
Awful but fascinating
lfisher026423 June 2008
Warning: Spoilers
...or as film historian Matthew Sweet has just called it - intoxicatingly drab. It's a steal from The Postman Always Rings Twice. Marilyn is married to an older man who owns a petrol station and a cafe. But she prefers garage hand Maxwell Reed, despite his ridiculous grease paint eyebrows. Her husband comes home unexpectedly from a business trip and threatens her - her boyfriend hits him and wouldn't you know it, he hits his head on the edge of a table like they always do. A passing motorist guesses there's some funny business going on, but he fancies Marilyn and he helps her turn the cafe into an "American bar". Which attracts a groovy young crowd despite being on the side of a lonely road in the middle of nowhere. He continues to pursue Marilyn, offering her everything she's always wanted. Meanwhile in the background is Marilyn's creepily devoted maid, Rose. You can tell it's going to end in tears. The location is brilliant - the tacky bar and the shabby Victorian house as a setting for Marilyn, who is ultra glamorous - as they used to say back then. Unfortunately the direction and acting are pretty dire. Reed was always wooden (though appealing). The playboy/spiv seems to have wandered in from the local amateur troupe. Even Vida Hope as Rose struggles -- not surprising since she's given nothing to do except express sickly adoration. (Hard to do when you're a natural comedienne.) Have a listen to the script, though, it's a lot cleverer than the cast make it sound.
So bad it's not even funny
kinory-11 June 2022
Dreadful beyond comprehension. Sandra Dorne can barely act, Vida Hope can't act at all, and the often excellent (if usually typecast) Ferdie Mayne has been given terrible lines to work with. Leslie Dwyer is reliable as always, in possibly his nastiest part ever. The cinematography is muddy, and the editing clunky. The ending is meaningless. The only bright spot is the hilarious poster, which bears zero relationship to the plot.
A British Postie!!
kidboots8 November 2015
Warning: Spoilers
"Roadhouse Girl" aka "Marilyn" (although on the credits of the print I have it is taken from a story "Marion" by Peter Jones) - maybe Marilyn was more topical, evoking Marilyn Monroe. Sandra Dorne definitely had that pouty look going on!! It was very much in the style of "The Postman Always Rings Twice" - Marilyn was clearly modelled on Lana Turner's Cora with Maxwell Reed as Tom the garage hand with his leather jacket and Teddy Boy hairstyle as the mysterious drifter Marilyn views as an exciting new future. The film starts in an interesting way with moody music and showing a long, straight highway with Tom arriving at the garage and immediately securing a job as a mechanic. Sandra Dorne once described her role as "a Bette Davis part at her finest", it isn't but Dorne did have a vogue in British Bs during the 50s. Another dramatic difference from the American "postman" is that Marilyn's husband, George, is established very soon after as a bully so audience sympathy is with the pair.
Marilyn is a natural flirt but life with George is hell!! He begrudges her music and in one scene is seen smirking after a violent scene, feeling he has "taught her a lesson". But with Marilyn it is all an act - she has no feelings for anyone else and when the deed is done she shows she has big plans for the diner - and they don't include Tom who she feels should realise his place!!
One person everyone forgets about is Rosie, Marilyn's constant protector with repressed lesbian overtones who stands meekly by, knowing exactly what happened to George on that stormy night and only turns on Marilyn when she realise that Marilyn is quite happy to go off with her new lover - a sleazy spiv, Nicky, and leave her alone. In fact the person who shows the most empathy is Tom - thinking he and Marilyn will be together, then hanging around in the background while Marilyn treats him as a lackey only to be left for dead when she and Nicky go off together!!
For some reason the distributor, Butchers (who had been in the film business since the Boer War) held back it's release and when it was, it had been edited of a couple of minutes. There was then an all out advertising blitz obviously with a view to U.S. release.
Marilyn is a natural flirt but life with George is hell!! He begrudges her music and in one scene is seen smirking after a violent scene, feeling he has "taught her a lesson". But with Marilyn it is all an act - she has no feelings for anyone else and when the deed is done she shows she has big plans for the diner - and they don't include Tom who she feels should realise his place!!
One person everyone forgets about is Rosie, Marilyn's constant protector with repressed lesbian overtones who stands meekly by, knowing exactly what happened to George on that stormy night and only turns on Marilyn when she realise that Marilyn is quite happy to go off with her new lover - a sleazy spiv, Nicky, and leave her alone. In fact the person who shows the most empathy is Tom - thinking he and Marilyn will be together, then hanging around in the background while Marilyn treats him as a lackey only to be left for dead when she and Nicky go off together!!
For some reason the distributor, Butchers (who had been in the film business since the Boer War) held back it's release and when it was, it had been edited of a couple of minutes. There was then an all out advertising blitz obviously with a view to U.S. release.
Where Have I Seen This Before?
boblipton27 March 2020
Gas station owner Leslie Dwyer hires drifter Maxwell Reed. He also mistreats his young wife, Sandra Dorne. Miss Dorne turns to Reed for comfort, but when Dwyer catches them together, there's an accident and Dwyer winds up dead.
Sounds like THE POSTMAN ALWAYS RING TWICE? Yes, it's very much that, if you can accept smarmy, pompadoured Reed in place of John Garfield. Certainly Miss Dorne is far trashier than Lana Turner seemed to me. The movie is hindered by its cheap production values -- the titles are displayed over a light concrete road, making them difficult to read. Geoffrey Faithfull's cinematography, though, is first rate.
Sounds like THE POSTMAN ALWAYS RING TWICE? Yes, it's very much that, if you can accept smarmy, pompadoured Reed in place of John Garfield. Certainly Miss Dorne is far trashier than Lana Turner seemed to me. The movie is hindered by its cheap production values -- the titles are displayed over a light concrete road, making them difficult to read. Geoffrey Faithfull's cinematography, though, is first rate.
If ever there was a better example of a British stab at American film noir then this could well be it.
jamesraeburn200310 January 2017
Warning: Spoilers
Marilyn (Sandra Dorne) is the dissatisfied glamorous young wife of the obnoxious and domineering garage-roadside cafe owner George Saunders (Leslie Dwyer). In the mechanic Tom Price (Maxwell Reid),she sees the opportunity for a more exciting life and the pair begin an affair, which results in her husband's death when he catches them together and attempts to strike her but Tom punches him to the ground hitting his head on the way down. The inquest files a verdict of accidental death and Tom believes that Marilyn loves him and that they will be together. However, free from her husband and having inherited his business, she promptly ditches him in favour of playboy and businessman Nicky Everton (Ferdy Mayne) for the wealth and high living she perceives he can give her. But, things turn out badly for her when Nicky begins to suspect that she and Tom may have committed a murder...
If there was ever a really credible example of an attempt from a British studio to do American style film noir then this could well be it. The feature directing debut of the talented Wolf Rilla (Village Of The Damned); it has a strong performance from Sandra Dorne who considered her role in this film to be in the mode of 'Bette Davis at her finest'. In the first half of the picture, Marilyn earns our sympathies as we witness her husband's bullying and ill-treatment of her such as frequently reminding her who it is who 'wears the trousers around here' and drives her to tears by telling her that he pays her alcoholic father two pounds a week to keep her away from him. Indeed, we can hardly blame her for seeking a better life and can well imagine Tom as a good man for her. However, once her husband has died, she quickly loses any sympathy we may of had for her at all and we discover that Marilyn is a completely selfish and opportunistic individual who will use anyone to achieve her own ends before ditching them and cares not a jot about hurting them.
The film is made all the more powerful in the dramatic change in her character and we feel sorry for Tom (played by Maxwell Reid who is somewhat wooden in that his face always seems to be set in a fixed expression, but it does not affect the film's impact on our emotions); the man she seduced and willed on into believing that she loved him in order to get him to rid her of her husband before ditching him and reminding him that he is only a hired employee and that, with all the people in the world she has to choose from, would she go out with the garage hand? Eva Hope is also noteworthy as Marilyn's loyal and faithful maid, Rosie, who she also uses and is prepared to drop just like that when Nicky offers to take her to South America but only on condition that Rosie does not tag along.
Wolf Rilla's direction is sympathetic to the project's noirish ambitions as is Geoffrey Faithful's deep focus, shadowy black and white lighting and, in many ways, Marilyn is an Americanised character in the dresses she wears and her love of jukeboxes.
In conclusion, Roadhouse Girl (released on DVD in the UK as Marilyn with Wolf Rilla's other b-pic Stock Car) does seem over simplified somewhat in its plot development and characterisations, but it does succeed in having an emotional impact upon its audience and it is certainly well above the usual standard one normally associates with British b-pics and its production company Butcher's Film Service.
If there was ever a really credible example of an attempt from a British studio to do American style film noir then this could well be it. The feature directing debut of the talented Wolf Rilla (Village Of The Damned); it has a strong performance from Sandra Dorne who considered her role in this film to be in the mode of 'Bette Davis at her finest'. In the first half of the picture, Marilyn earns our sympathies as we witness her husband's bullying and ill-treatment of her such as frequently reminding her who it is who 'wears the trousers around here' and drives her to tears by telling her that he pays her alcoholic father two pounds a week to keep her away from him. Indeed, we can hardly blame her for seeking a better life and can well imagine Tom as a good man for her. However, once her husband has died, she quickly loses any sympathy we may of had for her at all and we discover that Marilyn is a completely selfish and opportunistic individual who will use anyone to achieve her own ends before ditching them and cares not a jot about hurting them.
The film is made all the more powerful in the dramatic change in her character and we feel sorry for Tom (played by Maxwell Reid who is somewhat wooden in that his face always seems to be set in a fixed expression, but it does not affect the film's impact on our emotions); the man she seduced and willed on into believing that she loved him in order to get him to rid her of her husband before ditching him and reminding him that he is only a hired employee and that, with all the people in the world she has to choose from, would she go out with the garage hand? Eva Hope is also noteworthy as Marilyn's loyal and faithful maid, Rosie, who she also uses and is prepared to drop just like that when Nicky offers to take her to South America but only on condition that Rosie does not tag along.
Wolf Rilla's direction is sympathetic to the project's noirish ambitions as is Geoffrey Faithful's deep focus, shadowy black and white lighting and, in many ways, Marilyn is an Americanised character in the dresses she wears and her love of jukeboxes.
In conclusion, Roadhouse Girl (released on DVD in the UK as Marilyn with Wolf Rilla's other b-pic Stock Car) does seem over simplified somewhat in its plot development and characterisations, but it does succeed in having an emotional impact upon its audience and it is certainly well above the usual standard one normally associates with British b-pics and its production company Butcher's Film Service.
Cheapness shows, but maybe worth a look
adverts20 February 2024
Directed and scripted by Wolf Rilla, who later came into his own with Village of the Damned. He clearly has not mastered either directing or writing at this point. Scenes are awkward and the script....well, the script. Rilla often has a character repeat the same line or idea multiple times. You never really see this in a film and it came off as amateurish at first. When i thought about it, it actually was quite realistic. That's how folks often speak "in real life". Now, was it planned? Who knows? Regardless, it's interesting.
The acting is questionable as well. Marilyn's maid (who appears to be in love with Marilyn) never raises her voice. It comes off as a bit odd....as does Tom's acting. Again, I'm not sure what to make of it.
If you're a big noir fan, it's worth a look. Otherwise, pass.
The acting is questionable as well. Marilyn's maid (who appears to be in love with Marilyn) never raises her voice. It comes off as a bit odd....as does Tom's acting. Again, I'm not sure what to make of it.
If you're a big noir fan, it's worth a look. Otherwise, pass.
Marilyn Interprets The Plot
IcyTones14 January 2020
Warning: Spoilers
'Marilyn' is a British Film which was released for the US market under the title 'Roadhouse Girl'.
Marilyn yearned for the bright lights of shopping trips in London, and the opportunities to experience the night clubs of 'London' life. She often felt that her energetic vigour, good looks and charm was being 'wasted' living in a small town in rural England, married to a man whose only ambition is to make a success of his life, his business and 'manage' his wife's life.
I've heard men say the same thing or use the term 'what a waste', when they meet a beautiful woman who doesn't fit the pretty little 'wall flower' image.
Marilyn would often make her own party & imagine that she was out at a night club somewhere, by dressing up, playing some music from the the juke box & dancing by herself or with Rosie the servant or 'hired hand'.
Marilyn also resented the fact that life is full of people interfering in our lives and telling us what to do. If it's not friends, the doctors, political & religious leaders, school teachers etc, then society weighs down on you - and that's when things become really terrible & uncomfortable, because it isn't always what you want, nor is it always in your best interest. Like Marilyn, we go along with it for a while, looking for every opportunity to 'Bruk Out' or 'Strike Gold'. If no opportunity presents itself our inner soul dies, followed by our bodies. In Marilyn's case it was her husband that was standing in her way of happiness.
Rosie is right, sometimes you can be too clever. No-one really likes a 'know-it-all' or a clever clogs, but a gifted person 'draws' people in. Marilyn began to see herself as 'gifted'.
The ending of the movie was disappointing to say the least. It follows the old adage that 'Justice Prevails' or justice will prevail, yet when you watch documentary series 'Cold Case Files' & 'Unsolved Mysteries', you know that somebody somewhere is/has got away with murder and that justice hasn't prevailed - yet. I think the movie ending should've been written to highlight or represent the fact that Justice 'doesn't' always prevail in every murder case.
However, Rosie, who's obviously got her own issues going on, turns on Marilyn.
Marilyn yearned for the bright lights of shopping trips in London, and the opportunities to experience the night clubs of 'London' life. She often felt that her energetic vigour, good looks and charm was being 'wasted' living in a small town in rural England, married to a man whose only ambition is to make a success of his life, his business and 'manage' his wife's life.
I've heard men say the same thing or use the term 'what a waste', when they meet a beautiful woman who doesn't fit the pretty little 'wall flower' image.
Marilyn would often make her own party & imagine that she was out at a night club somewhere, by dressing up, playing some music from the the juke box & dancing by herself or with Rosie the servant or 'hired hand'.
Marilyn also resented the fact that life is full of people interfering in our lives and telling us what to do. If it's not friends, the doctors, political & religious leaders, school teachers etc, then society weighs down on you - and that's when things become really terrible & uncomfortable, because it isn't always what you want, nor is it always in your best interest. Like Marilyn, we go along with it for a while, looking for every opportunity to 'Bruk Out' or 'Strike Gold'. If no opportunity presents itself our inner soul dies, followed by our bodies. In Marilyn's case it was her husband that was standing in her way of happiness.
Rosie is right, sometimes you can be too clever. No-one really likes a 'know-it-all' or a clever clogs, but a gifted person 'draws' people in. Marilyn began to see herself as 'gifted'.
The ending of the movie was disappointing to say the least. It follows the old adage that 'Justice Prevails' or justice will prevail, yet when you watch documentary series 'Cold Case Files' & 'Unsolved Mysteries', you know that somebody somewhere is/has got away with murder and that justice hasn't prevailed - yet. I think the movie ending should've been written to highlight or represent the fact that Justice 'doesn't' always prevail in every murder case.
However, Rosie, who's obviously got her own issues going on, turns on Marilyn.
a low-budget, high blood-pressured, doomily Dashiell Hammett-ed pot-boiler!
Weirdling_Wolf5 October 2021
B-Movie maestro Wolf Rilla 'rilla' delivers some super-melodramatic Brit-Noir pizazz in the splendidly monikered 'Roadhouse Girl', a low-budget, high blood-pressured, doomily Dashiell Hammett-ed pot-boiler, wherein itinerant grease monkey, the tall drink of dish water Tom Price (Maxwell Reed) secures employment at an isolated, somewhat insalubrious roadside garage, owned by dour, hypertensive, oily misanthrope George Sanders (Leslie Dwyer), who is incongruously married to the breathtakingly beauteous, vastly frustrated, serially flirtatious Marilyn (Sandra Dorne), and before you can say 'lipstick on my crankshaft', the considerably 'handy' Tom enthusiastically provides some extracurricular lubrication service for this divine-looking, dingy dive-dancin' Roadhouse-rocking, B-Movie bombshell!
Wolf Rilla's black-seamed, steamy-windowed melodrama about the increasingly volatile ménage à trois between Brylcreemed, sleazy operator Nick (Ferdy Mayne), the wildly quixotic, weirdly petulant Marilyn, and big, greasy-fingered lug Tom sinfully simmers to a suitably fraught, deliciously dramatic, exciting B-Movie Noir conclusion! In this delightfully tawdry, tannin-stained, low rent gloomy thriller, overheated, highly revved, erotically charged emotions dangerously percolate to a perfectly hysterical, wonderfully camp, bathos-laden climax, while juicy bombshell Marilyn is initially one sticky sweet confection, said glossy veneer belies a poisonously malignant centre, 'Marilyn' is moody Brit-Noir at its finest/dingiest!
Wolf Rilla's black-seamed, steamy-windowed melodrama about the increasingly volatile ménage à trois between Brylcreemed, sleazy operator Nick (Ferdy Mayne), the wildly quixotic, weirdly petulant Marilyn, and big, greasy-fingered lug Tom sinfully simmers to a suitably fraught, deliciously dramatic, exciting B-Movie Noir conclusion! In this delightfully tawdry, tannin-stained, low rent gloomy thriller, overheated, highly revved, erotically charged emotions dangerously percolate to a perfectly hysterical, wonderfully camp, bathos-laden climax, while juicy bombshell Marilyn is initially one sticky sweet confection, said glossy veneer belies a poisonously malignant centre, 'Marilyn' is moody Brit-Noir at its finest/dingiest!
Cheap but surspringly well made.
ofpsmith22 January 2019
Warning: Spoilers
Tom Price (Maxwell Reed) is a new employee at a roadside gas station in rural England. Very shortly after he gets there he gets way in over his head with Marylin Saunders (Sandra Dorne) the much younger wife of the gas station's owner and manager George Saunders (Leslie Dwyer). Marylin gets involved with Price almost immediately and the two end up killing George and begin a cover up as soon as it goes to trial. There's also a subplot about a playboy who woos Marylin with the idea of a trip to South America, leaving Price jealous. Price eventually turns on Marylin and they both get arrested. Although the movie's fairly cheap it's certainly entertaining for what it is and manages to keep you engaged. It's also better made than one would expect, with the acting being more than serviceable. It's true that it takes a lot of The Postman Always Rings Twice, but only in the first part. From there it's fairly divergent.
Yearning
richardchatten26 January 2022
Wolf Rilla made an extraordinary directorial debut with this nihilistic piece of low life which most commentators have compared to 'The Postman Always Rings Twice' but actually more resembles 'Ossessione'.
Leslie Dwyer is meaner and more dictatorial than the husband usually is, Sandra Dorne just a spoilt child with terrible taste in men; and no prizes for guessing which side Vida Hope bats for.
Leslie Dwyer is meaner and more dictatorial than the husband usually is, Sandra Dorne just a spoilt child with terrible taste in men; and no prizes for guessing which side Vida Hope bats for.
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