Review by Gary Tooze

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***

Jo (Anne Bancroft) leaves the banality of her marriage to second husband Giles (Richard Johnson) to wed her screenwriter lover, Jake Armitage (Peter Finch), but insists her new husband adhere to her strict marital ideals. Though their relationship is passionate, Jo, now a mother of six, begins to feel stifled in her role as a doting homemaker -- and increasingly isolated from Peter, who is filming on location in Morocco. Jo's sanity is shaken when it seems Peter is not being faithful.

 

 

The Film:

Peter Finch and James Mason were "the two best screen actors of the English 1960s, even when they work in rubbish," according to the gifted Alan Bates, who appeared in films with both of them. There's much support for that statement in The Pumpkin Eater, a spellbinding 1964 drama that's the opposite of rubbish, thanks to Jack Clayton's remarkably creative directing and Harold Pinter's boldly intelligent screenplay. And as marvelous as Finch and Mason are, Anne Bancroft, who scored an Oscar® nomination for the film, outshines them both as the central character, an emotionally troubled woman caught in psychological traps set by herself as well as the highly unsatisfactory men in her life.

Her name is Jo Armitage, and at the beginning of the movie she's wandering aimlessly around her comfortable London house, dressed to go shopping but too moody and distracted to make it out the door. Flashbacks reveal some of her history. Years earlier she lived in a ramshackle barn with her second husband, a violinist named Giles, and their five rambunctious children.

It is rare to see a film that readily and insightfully enters in to the psyche of so inward (not to mention, neurotic) a personality. But The Pumpkin Eater does so successfully. What is more, it balances this deep, interior world with occasional glimpses of a world outside. Perhaps the most memorable of all these sojourns is Jo’s visit to the hairdresser’s. While Jo is getting her hair done, there sits beside her a nameless young woman, played by the great Yootha Joyce. At first, Joyce’s character is terribly starstruck by Jo, whom she recognises from the glamorous magazines. Admiration and flattery turn into misery though as imagining Mrs Armitage’s perfect existence calls her back to her own sad little life, which she describes as only “an empty place”. Things take an even nastier turn as misery morphs into anger and psychosis; the camera draws closer and close to the two women, and the nameless lady directs her rage at the only other left in the frame: Jo Armitage. We go in for a close-up of Jo, and rest awhile on her sad, empty eyes. At that moment, she and the audience share in the same realisation: beyond her existence is only another — a world just as sad, just as full of suffering.

Excerpt SunsetBoulevard located HERE

Image :    NOTE: The below Blu-ray captures were taken directly from the Blu-ray disc.

The Pumpkin Eater arrives on Blu-ray from Indicator out of the UK. The image quality is immensely impressive with consistently strong contrast and a pleasing, and consistent, layer of grain. As usual, this is dual-layered with a max'ed out bitrate. It is neither glossy nor soft and shows beautiful black and white visuals with notable depth. There is some impressive detail in the film's close-ups.  I would guess the 1.85:1 image is top-shelf in terms of video quality. It is pristinely clean, and essentially perfect. This Blu-ray has Indicator's usual impressively competent HD transfer.

CLICK EACH BLU-RAY CAPTURE TO SEE ALL IMAGES IN FULL 1920X1080 RESOLUTION

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The audio is transferred via a linear PCM authentically mono at 1152 kbps (24-bit). There are no aggressive effects - being almost fully dialogue-driven. The film's music is notable for the emotionally impacting score by the great Georges Delerue (The High Commissioner, Silkwood, Mister Johnson, Jules et Jim, The Woman Next Door, The Last Metro, Day For Night) and it, like the video, is without flaw - sounding brilliant in supporting the film via the uncompressed. There are optional English (SDH) subtitles and my Oppo has identified it as being a region FREE - playable world-wide.

Extras :

Indicator offer a new selected scene audio commentary with author (A Wonderful Heart: The Films of William Wyler) and film historian Neil Sinyard. It runs about 50-minutes and is excellent but it is not mixed into the film's audio - which is silent (except the music of the end credits.) I enjoyed the deep analysis - the film as a ghost story, comparisons to Bunuel, descriptions of deviations from Pinter's screenplay and stories of Bancroft, Clayton and Sinyard extol the film and gives a solid argument for its, less-recognized, excellence. We get, a new, 1/2 hour of Jeremy Mortimer on Penelope Mortimer - a personal remembrance by the author's son that has some revealing moments. Brian West on 'The Pumpkin Eater' is also new but a brief 3.5 minutes by the film's camera operator recalls his time working with Jack Clayton and celebrated director of photography Oswald Morris. Dinah and Fergus is a new interview with actors Frances White and Fergus McClelland remembering playing their roles as children in The Pumpkin Eater. It lasts a dozen minutes. There is an original theatrical trailer and image gallery of on-set and promotional photography plus the package is a limited edition of 3,000 copies with an exclusive booklet with a new essay by British-film expert Melanie Williams, an overview of contemporary critical responses, and historic articles.

 

 

BOTTOM LINE:
The Pumpkin Eater is a fascinating story of a failed marriage. For decades Anne Bancroft has been one of my absolute favorite actresses - she is so impressive here. The camera loves her every subtle expression - she is hypnotically photogenic - what an amazing talent. The Pumpkin Eater is a very sad, probing and beautifully shot piece of cinema. What a wonderful choice for Indicator to bring to Blu-ray where the HD presentation is perfect in both audio and video and the package contains plenty of valuable extras starting with the select-scene commentary. The Blu-ray is very strongly recommended to both fans of the director, performers, composer, cinematographer - or just plain old unforgettable cinema. Don't let this one get away!

Gary Tooze

December 1st, 2017

 

The standard Blu-ray edition is coming from Indicator in the UK in April 2022: or buy from Indicator: