Atmospheric, startlingly mature adaptation of Alan Sillitoe's novel (by the author) regarding Arthur Seaton, a 20-ish working-class Brit employed at the local factory and still living at home, who is 'knocking about' with a co-worker's wife while despairing against marriage (and the TV-watching rut his parents have slipped into). Just as he begins courting a local lovely with mother-troubles of her own, he finds out his married playmate is pregnant. Prickly film has fine moments of both tension and schoolboy humor, propelled by Albert Finney's flawless central performance. Highly-influential in its time, and still powerful today, the picture employs a confrontational tone with acerbic dialogue, never lapsing into fake pathos or dreary ruminations. It is ripe and alert and alive. *** from ****
