La chica de los ojos verdes

Bitter sweet tale beautifully adapted for the screen by Edna O'Brien from her own novel. It is a difficult subject. a young girl's infatuation with an older married man but the dialogue is so good it even convinces when you initially feel that a scene is unlikely to work. Her inviting him out to tea, her opening his bedroom door are prickly moments dealt with so well they seem perfectly natural. Rita Tushingham and Peter Finch are perfect in their roles and director Desmond Davis' light touch in the first of a short run of successful films ensures that there is almost something magical now and again. Of course, such a subject would be controversial anywhere, anytime but early 60s Ireland it must have been very much a no, no and the film does not avoid this. Indeed it confronts the hypocrisy of family and church very well including a devastating eulogy from the local priest which absolves men from just about anything, except the matter in hand. You can take a girl out of a convent but not the convent out of the girl, is the ardent hope of these primitive souls but perhaps no more as recently uncovered horrors have exposed even greater hypocrisy and criminality in the name of the Lord. In the end the film says more about the making and keeping or changing friends (and lovers) and is a surprisingly insightful outing.