Mjeteconer Just perfect...

Listonixio Fresh and Exciting

BoardChiri Bad Acting and worse Bad Screenplay

Scarlet The film never slows down or bores, plunging from one harrowing sequence to the next.

p-hodges536 I have only recently seen this film, and it's baffling how I missed seeing such a good film for so long. The story could be looked on as a humdrum kitchen sink drama, but it's so much more than that. It centres on a common situation in which a married man becomes disillusioned with his marriage and has an affair with a work colleague. The acting of the main players is totally believable, and flawlessly evokes the emotional complexities of their situation. Special mention should be made of Yvonne Mitchell, who plays the the wronged wife. She gives one of the best performances I've ever seen by any actress. She deserved to be oscar nominated for this. If you haven't seen this film then it's a MUST see. It's that good.

blacknorth It's a matter of deep regret that Woman In A Dressing Gown remains unreleased on DVD and is rarely, if ever, screened on television. As a previous commenter noted, it's the first of the kitchen sink drama's which became so fashionable in the 1960's, and it's the best.The story is unremarkable; clerk Anthony Quayle is having an affair with his firm's secretary, Sylvia Sims. His wife, Yvonne Mitchell, devoted, but suffering from a clinical depression which leads her to be alternatively hysterical and morose, knows nothing, believing her husband to be equally devoted, so when Quayle breaks the news that he plans to divorce her, she goes to pieces. This unpromising situation is electrified by several elements; Yvonne Mitchell's searing performance, a spare script, and some very claustrophobic settings. Mitchell owns this film; her character is so helpless, so self-effacing, that Quayleand Sims offer her the best kind of support - they let her do her own thing. Long sequences find Mitchell alone - at the cooker, at the kitchen table, at the window - and each of these scenes is a masterpiece of momentum worthy of any noir. But isn't kitchen sink drama the most casual noir and therefore the most terrifying? Really one would have to see Mitchell in action - her habitual burning of family breakfasts, her abortive trip uptown to dolly up and win back her man, most of all her only companion - a faded dressing gown which acts as comfort blanket to the woman. She is stunning and deservedly won many plaudits for her performance.Credit must also go to Anthony Quayle who underplays his natural strengths as an actor. His perplexity at finding himself an object of desire is played out beautifully and logically to the conclusion. Sylvia Sims also impresses as the other woman, a slip of a thing whose scenes are fragile but safe because we know she is in no danger from herself.The script is taken from a television play by Ted Willis which was broadcast in the early days of ITV. I have no idea whether it still exists, probably not, given British television's habit of treating archives as ephemera - there is nothing ephemeral about Woman In A Dressing Gown. It is blindingly and viscerally memorable. Neither do I have any idea who currently owns the rights to this film but I must say they ought to be ashamed of themselves - it needs to be restored and issued on DVD before it's completely forgotten.All in all, a lovely and unsung classic for connoisseurs of everything vital.

donaldgordon797 To me this movie must be the first of the "kitchen sink" dramas of post war Britain as it came out in the fifties,long before the sixties made the genre popular. Woman in a Dressing Gown has been described by film historian Jeffrey Richards as "a Brief Encounter of the council flats", taking the scenario of a extra-marital affair and relocating to a less middle-class setting. However, writer Ted Willis described it more simply, as a film about " good honest fumbling people, caught up in tiny tragedies". As its female-focused title suggests, the film spends a lot of time on Amy, the wife whose devastated when her husband asks for a divorce. She gives it the works as the drudge who fights to rekindle the affection of her husband. There's a great bit when her new hairdo gets ruined by the rain, but it's heavy weather throughout. Amy is anything but the model '50s housewife: she burns food, never finishes the housework, always has the radio on too loud, and rarely has time to get dressed properly. But the film allows us to see reasons why she might have become that way (grief,loneliness,boredom) rather than simply demonising her. Do not watch this film if your at a low and feeling depressed as it will definitely not help. Yvonne Mitchells bravura performance won her the Berlin Film Festival's Silver Bear award for best actress

magdalene65 I remember watching this film as a young girl. It was a bit over my head as far as the complexity of emotions but the situation was quite clear. The story of a middle aged couple: the husband, still attractive and a bit worldly, has become attracted to a young woman...the wife, a bit shop-worn and, having been a housewife and entirely devoted only to her family for nearly two decades, appears dull in the eyes of her husband. However, so moving was the performance of Ms. Mitchell as the wife, so clear the pain and desperation she displayed in attempting to keep her husband when it becomes clear she is losing him, that I remembered nearly every bit of the movie and retained it until years later when I could feel full empathy for her. I see this movie as a sad, sweet study of a universal type of woman: the house-bound, devoted and totally self-sacrificing wife who has, perhaps, given too much of herself to her family and kept too little for herself.