Wonderful character development!

It really made me laugh, but for some moments I was tearing up because I could relate so much.

Story: It's very simple but honestly that is fine.

Like the great film, it's made with a great deal of visible affection both in front of and behind the camera.

While trying to keep this film's 1969 time-frame firmly in mind - I certainly have to say that I found having actress Beryl Reid in my face for 2 hours & 20 minutes (with her abrasive, scenery-chewing "June Buckridge" character) to be (almost) too unbearable to endure at times.A hateful, nasty, jealous and temperamental boozer - Was June Buckridge really supposed to be looked upon as being a fair representation of an older, butch lesbian (who was having a very stormy affair with a very girlish and feminine woman who was young enough to be her daughter)? If you ask me - This badly-dated, British production (filmed in Metrocolor) was so antagonistic in nature that it only succeeded in reinforcing the most negative lesbian stereotypes imaginable.And, finally - I think that director Robert Aldrich handled this film's subject matter very poorly. As an example of just that - The nightclub scene of same-sex couples slow-dancing together certainly went way beyond the point of being just clumsy and awkward. It sure did. In fact, it was downright atrocious!

Seeing Beryl Reid mouth silently a four-letter swear word when such things didn't happen in films and drunkenly canoodling with two young nuns in the back of a London cab is both quite outstanding and rather lovable.Miss Reid, who I only got to see in my childhood as a twee, granny-like innocent (the sort that she plays for real in a TV serial as Sister George, a homely district nurse), I found The Killing Of... both delicious and ever astounding in its frankness and of her rather warped relationship with the much younger Susannah York.Warped, not because of the age difference, nor of their same-sex partnership, but because June Buckridge (Reid) has a cruel streak that is borne out by her playing sadistic mind games with Alice "Childie" (York).Sister George, in the best tradition of TV soaps, is being killed off, to make way for an Australian replacement. Hence June's venomous outpourings and increasingly erratic behaviour.Equally interesting is the London of the late '60s, both in its landmarks but also its people and fashions, whether that's in how they live and/or how they dress and present themselves.Though real soaps cover such material freely and openly these days, 42 years ago, it must have been a very different kettle of fish. Lesbianism back in those days was not only considered immoral but also a mental aberration and had to be so hidden, in an attempt to prove to those 'righteous' souls that it did not exist. Therefore, it must have been a very brave undertaking as a film, though it originated as a play, written by Frank Marcus.Having now seen it again, I consider Robert Aldrich's ground-breaking film to be a bit of a classic and one, which, no doubt I'll want to see again in a few years time. It really is a piece of British cinematic history.

A supremely entertaining film I thought, WAY ahead of it's time for the content and theme. The 'showdown' scene between 'Sister George' (Reid) and 'Mercy Croft'(Browne) was excruciatingly funny! a two way band of vitriolic hatred-the dialogue was bitchy and vitriolic in the extreme, overall an excellent movie that contains pathos/paranoia/jealousy/mind-games/spite and vast amounts of HUMOUR!! The fashions and locations are very 'period' of the time-Late sixties. A very good script that never let's you down-you almost can't wait for the next injurious insult/put-down to be heard-I truly believe the way those sentences were constructed were very over the top, but somehow very real and true to life - even now.

This movie is a heck of a lot more relevant than more recent films dealing with lesbianism -- the shallow, lame DESERT HEARTS comes to mind. Though over two hours long, TKOSG held me with little effort. The action moved freely from the studio to the apartment to the pub. And the seduction scene was totally erotic and ... well ... never mind. Was this particular scene overly long? Only to a generation raised on sex scenes which rarely last as long as it takes to cook a three-minute egg. Explicit? Grow up!And the performances ... wow! I had no problem with the hold George had over Childie, with Beryl Reid's superior portrayal complemented perfectly by Susannah York's fragile and, at the same time, forceful Childie. I must admit, York was a bit over the top in the beginning, but I wouldn't say that if I didn't count her as one of my all-time favorite actresses. And how about Coral Browne -- she was sensational! Sublty menacing, eerily sensuous -- and when I realized this was the same woman from AUNTIE MAME and LYLA CLARE, well, I nearly fell off my chair. I love this lady!