Main Cast: Peter Finch, Rita Tushingham, Lynn Redgrave, Marie Kean, Julian Glover
Release Year: 1964
Country: UK
Run Time: 91 minutes
Plot
Rita Tushingham was propelled into stardom with The Girl with Green Eyes. She plays a gawky young rural Irish girl who takes a room with a wise-cracking Dublin lass (Lynn Redgrave). Enter a middle-aged writer (Peter Finch), who makes a beeline for the shy, lonely Tushingham--completely ignoring her more worldly roommate. Girl with Green Eyes was liberally based upon Edna O'Brien's novella The Lonely Girl. With this one film, Rita Tushingham not only became bankable, but also what is known as a "critic's darling", meaning that she could do no wrong in the eyes of certain male reviewers. The bloom was off the rose fairly quickly, and soon Ms. Tushingham found herself contractually committed to one second-string project after another, including an ill-advised reteaming with actress Lynn Redgrave and director Desmond Davis in the resistible Smashing Time (67). ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
Review
Girl With Green Eyes is a small, quiet little gem of a picture. It's not a great, life-changing "drama for the ages," but it's a haunting small film that lingers pleasantly in the mind long after the last frame. Desmond Davis' directorial debut is surprisingly assured; it straddles the worlds of 1960s British kitchen-sink realism and the French nouvelle vague and yet manages to reconcile the differences between these two schools into a coherent whole. There's a refreshing poetry to Girl, both in the simple language and in the visual compositions that Davis employs. It's a poetry that both wounds and heals. The screenplay does a fine job of setting up its situations, establishing its characters, and then letting things head where they need to go. Best of all, Girl gives us the delicious Rita Tushingham in one of her best roles, full of both life and delicacy and coming across as charming without ever being artificial. Peter Finch is a bit off his form, but Lynn Redgrave is right on the money all the way through. Girl With Green Eyes is a lovely film whose flaws are easily forgiven. ~ Craig Butler, All Movie Guide
T.P. McKenna - Priest; Lislott Goettinger - Joanna; Patrick Laffan - Bertie Counihan; Eileen Crowe - Mrs. Byrne; May Craig - Aunt; Joe Lynch - Andy Devlin; Yolande Turner - Mary; Harry Brogan - Jack Holland; Michael O'Brian - Lodger; Michael Hennessy - Davey; Oliver Macgreevy - Duggan; Arthur O'Sullivan - Mr. Brady; Joseph O'Donnell - Patrick Devlin; David Kelly - Ticket Collector
Credit
Ted Marshall - Art Director, Barbara Gillett - Costume Designer, Roy Millichip - First Assistant Director, Desmond Davis - Director, Antony Gibbs - Editor, Brian Smedley-Aston - Editor, Tony Richardson - Executive Producer, John Addison - Composer (Music Score), John Addison - Musical Direction/Supervision, Bob Lawrence - Makeup, Dennis C. Lewiston - Camera Operator, Manny Wynn - Cinematographer, Oscar Lewenstein - Producer, Stephen Dalby - Sound/Sound Designer, Edna O'Brien - Screenwriter, Edna O'Brien - Book Author
In 1960s Dublin, Kate Brady, a young rural girl, takes a room with a wise-cracking woman, Baba Brennan. She becomes involved with a much older man, a writer named Eugene Gaillard, who eyes her and ignores her more worldly roommate.
