Why so much hype?

Save your money for something good and enjoyable

I like movies that are aware of what they are selling... without [any] greater aspirations than to make people laugh and that's it.

The acting is good, and the firecracker script has some excellent ideas.

"Look Back in Anger" marked the beginning of what would become known as the "Kitchen Sink" drama. In addition, John Osborne's play signalled the beginning of a new breed of actor in the British acting industry. There would be actors who would make plays and films which would reflect life in Britain as it really was. If Richard Burton had made more films like the above, then his film career would have been infinitely more satisfying. He is a tower of strength as the original angry young man, Jimmy Porter. Suffering from having an inferiority complex and also a chip on his shoulder, he voices his anger and unhappiness upon his long- suffering wife (well played by Mary Ure). Claire Bloom scored a triumph as Porter's lover. Richard Burton's highly distinctive Welsh voice is put to full use and exercises a wide range of emotions as a result. The film is an excellent adaptation of the play and it highlights the struggles of one man who feels he doesn't belong anywhere except where he is - running a market stall 5 days a week. He was actually a university student and is reduced to wasting his potential. His bitterness is aimed at his in-laws, his mother- in-law in particular. The way he describes her in a tone of mockery and being smarmy, sums up the situation pretty well. You never quite know when the next verbal assault will happen and you brace yourself for when it does. Underneath the anger, there lays a sadness and vulnerability about Porter. His affair with Claire Bloom reveals a more calm and sensitive side to his personality. The scene at the beginning which takes place on a Sunday morning, shows Jimmy Porter staring out the window at the nearby church. The church bells are ringing and Porter screams at the top of his voice, wanting the ringing to cease. Such fiery passion is produced by Burton's voice, I have rarely witnessed such a vocal display. The only other exceptions I can immediately think of, are Robert Shaw, Rod Steiger, Marlon Brando, Gene Hackman and Patrick McGoohan. This is a landmark film and it is just as powerful now as it was back in the 1950s.

I've seen over thirty Richard Burton movies, and there really isn't any good reason to watch this one. Even if you particularly like his acting, all he does is shout cruelties for ninety minutes. And even if you particularly like Claire Bloom, she wears one deadpan expression for ninety minutes. There's just no point to Look Back in Anger, besides an intriguing title.A married couple doesn't get along, and for no explained reason a mutual male friend lives with them in their English flat. Also, for no explained reason, the male friend never stands up to Richard Burton when he berates his wife. And, it's never really explained why the two were married in the first place, or why they haven't thrown in the towel since whatever they have isn't working. Claire Bloom invites her actress girlfriend Mary Ure to stay with them for a couple of weeks, and even though Richard and Mary claim to hate each other, we can all guess what's going to happen. Figure that you've guessed correctly and rent Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? instead.

To watch "Look Back In Anger" so many decades after its brief era of relevancy is to encounter a head-scratchingly pointless film and wonder what all of the yelling was about. This dank and claustrophobic look at one of Britain's army of post-war "Angry Young Men" might be a tad more bearable were Richard Burton asked to take it down a notch. Burton's endless bellowing (second only to Peter O'Toole's bray-as-acting style) is ill served by it never being made quite clear just what this guy is so miffed at all the time.Surrounded by characters that either incomprehensibly find him a lovable lad (Gary Raymond, Edith Evans) or serve as doormats (Mary Ure, Claire Bloom), Burton's character is given free rein to act like a colicky brat for most of the film without ever giving us much of a clue as to the root of his dissatisfaction. Brief references to Britain's class system, racial injustice, loss of loved ones and any number of social ills feel insufficient as explanations to the source of Burton's unpleasant personality. After 40 minutes or so of being subjected to one narcissistically histrionic rage after another, one just wishes he'd shut up and realize that he isn't the only one suffering…he's just the only one who seems hell-bent on making sure others are as miserable as he is.That being said,the entire film is not devoid of certain pleasures (the photography is appropriately dingy, Claire Bloom is always a delight and Gary Raymond, so good in "Suddenly Last Summer," was a real surprise here with a more sizable role) but it's near unbearable being subjected to a film about a man feeling sorry for himself non-stop. It struck me as being sophomoric in theory and tedious in execution.If this film reminds me on anything, it's of an episode of "The Flintstones" where Fred is cast with wife Wilma in a kitchen-sink domestic drama about an abusive, lout of a husband and his meek wife. The show's title: "The Frogmouth," a perfect subtitle for this mess- Richard Burton in "Look Back in Anger aka The Frogmouth."

"Look back in Anger" was not an instant hit as a play.It took the transmission by ITV of a truncated version starring Richard Pascoe as Jimmy Porter to bring it to a wider less theatrically sophisticated audience and,by extension,popularise it.This action was also incidentally the intention of John Osbourne who,along with the others in the so - called "Kitchen Sink" movement was to reclaim the theatre for ordinary working people by writing about lives and situations that had some relevance to their own. The play was to some extent autobiographical as far as it reflected Osbourne's first marriage,but Osbourne himself was no Jimmy Porter , rather he invented Porter as a character to give himself a platform on which to articulate those views that no one would listen to if he personally was to express them. Once Porter was accepted as a "voice",Osbourne could happily say whatever he liked(and frequently did) without necessarily believing in any or all of it. The form of the play was reassuringly traditional - nothing of the Beckett or Brecht about it - but the content was viciously "anti - theatre". With Osbourne's known admiration for Music Hall and Variety it is tempting to see parallels between Porter and the great Tony Hancock. Both inveterate snobs,prone to stream of consciousness dialogue,world class ranters living in seedy digs with subordinate pals.Both these great creations talk the talk but ultimately fail to walk the walk. In using Richard Burton for the movie version Tony Richardson made a fatal - if understandable - error.Too physically beautiful,too "Actorish",paradoxically too well - known,too recognisably not an embittered University Man running a market stall in order to remain true to his principles and prejudices.And once your lead has been compromised everything else around it begins collapsing. Taking Porter away from his soapbox and out onto the street further weakens the film.The efficacy of the play is to a large extent dependent on the claustrophobic gloomy set. Mr Osbourne was not a poet of the working - class,he was a poet for the working - class,not the same thing at all.He may have had hated all that he believed England had become,but like Jimmy,he chose to do nothing about it.Instead,through his mouthpiece,he chose to bellow clever words that appealed to the Armchair Revolutionaries of half a century ago and still appeal to their counterparts today. The trouble is the same snouts are still deep in the trough and the same people are still out in the cold.And it's still deeds,not words,that count.