Only Two Can Play (1962)

John Lewis is bored by his librarian's job and henpecked at home. Then Liz, wife of a local councilor, sets her sights on him. But this is risky stuff in a Welsh valleys town - if he and Liz ever manage to consummate their affair, that is.

Director: Sidney Gilliat
Cast: Peter Sellers, Mai Zetterling, Virginia Maskell, Kenneth Griffith, Raymond Huntley, David Davies, Maudie Edwards, Meredith Edwards, John Le Mesurier, Frederick Piper, Graham Stark, Eynon Evans, John Arnatt, Sheila Manahan, Richard Attenborough, Lindy Cope, Howell Evans, Howard Greene, Ronnie Harries, Margaret Lacey, Marjie Lawrence, Desmond Llewelyn, Charles Lloyd Pack, Meg Wynn Owen, John Rees, Gerald Sim, Hazel Squires, Gillian Vaughan, Joanna Vogel, George Woodbridge



Easily one of the best early Peter Sellers films, if not one of his overall best. Based on the novel That Uncertain Feeling by Kingsley Amis. Also starring the beautiful Virginia Maskell as his wife in one of her last roles before an untimely death.

Mr Peter Sellers as John Lewis the oversexed librarian is in thrall to Mrs Gruffyd-Williams (Mai Zetterling) from the moment they meet. Imprisoned in a dreary flat and an equally dreary marriage, a victim of his libido, Lewis is desperately seeking a little spice. Rather than a film of the sixties, this is very much a film of the fifties. It negotiates the labyrinthine complexities of post world war two British society skillfully, following the guidelines set down by Kingsley Amis (a determinedly 1950s man) in his novel. Adultery is contemplated, even attempted but never actually committed. Set in Wales, a country that at the time was considered to be even more prudish than middle-England, the film pokes fun at social and intellectual pretensions as personified by Mr Kenneth Griffith and Sir Richard Attenborough respectively. The social and sexual aspirations of Mr Peter Sellers' character are gently mocked too. It contains a fine portrait of a woman whose life is crumbling round her as she desperately struggles to keep it all together that is worthy of a less light-hearted context. The late Miss Virginia Maskell reminds us with her portrayal of Lewis's wife that adultery may be a game that only two can play, but others are always on the sidelines.

IMDb

Download