Out of Season (1975 film)

Joe Turner returns to a picturesque seaside resort twenty years after he ended a romantic relationship with Ann, who is still running the same hotel where he knew her, but she now has a grown daughter named Joanna. Joe and Ann attempt to renew their relationship, but with interference from Joanna, who flirts with Joe from the moment she meets him and competes with her mother for his attention.

Days into Joe's return, an argument with Ann leads to him leaving, but Joanna follows him in the car and asks him to stay. He ignores her, but late that night he returns to the hotel. In his bedroom, Joe unexpectedly discovers one of the women, whose face cannot be seen, offering herself to him, and he wordlessly accepts her invitation. The following morning, Joe behaves as if he thinks the woman was Ann, and he and Ann attempt to continue to revive their relationship, but the evening ends with Joanna announcing to the other two that she had been with Joe the previous night. Joe says nothing, but Ann responds by physically dragging Joanna upstairs and locking her in her bedroom. Joe agrees with Ann that he will leave for a few weeks, to attend to some business he has in London, and then come back.

After Ann goes to bed, Joanna escapes out of her window and lets herself back into the hotel, where she finds Joe sitting alone downstairs. His initial attempts to send her back to her room fail, and they succumb to their feelings and have sex. Ann catches them in the act and coldly tells Joe that she had previously lied to him when she said Joanna's father was dead, and says there was never anyone else, implying that Joe is Joanna's father.

The next day, one of the women is seen leaving the resort by train, while the other woman remains with Joe at the hotel, but their faces are not shown. Joe talks about fixing up the place before next summer season, and sits down to play cards with the woman.{{cite web|url=http://www.tvguide.com/movies/out-of-season/review/108464/ |title=Out Of Season - Movie Reviews and Movie Ratings |publisher=TVGuide.com |date= |access-date=13 November 2017}}

• Vanessa Redgrave as Ann
• Cliff Robertson as Joe Turner
• Susan George as Joanna
• Edward Evans as Charlie
• Frank Jarvis as Postman

The film was originally titled Winter Rates and was announced by Daily Variety in 1974 to be starring Redgrave and Oliver Reed. It had an expected budget of approximately $500,000.

Out of Season was filmed at Elstree Studios in Borehamwood, Hertfordshire, and on location in Dorset, primarily at the Isle of Portland, including the village of Chiswell.{{cite web|url=https://catalog.afi.com/Catalog/moviedetails/55680|title=AFI-Catalog|website=catalog.afi.com|access-date=13 November 2017}}{{cite web |title=Out of Season |url=https://www.reelstreets.com/films/out-of-season/ |website=REELSTREETS |access-date=13 May 2025}} The sets were designed by the art director Robert Jones.

Variety said: "Virtually a three-hander, Out of Season boasts top-notch performances by Redgrave, Robertson and George, a taut script and first-rate direction. Bridges displays his ability to develop and hold obsessive situations, all hints and innuendos, and this ping pong match of the affections often has the suspense of a whodunit."{{cite web|author=Variety Staff |url=https://variety.com/1974/film/reviews/out-of-season-1200423416/ |title=Out of Season – Variety |work=Variety |date=31 December 1974 |access-date=13 November 2017}} TV Guide awarded the film three stars, commenting: "A small cast in a tight environment makes this film look like exactly what it is - a stage play adapted for the screen." Time Out noted: "The super-smooth Alan Bridges finds himself landed with an impossible project. The dire script wrings every possible cliché out of the situation. The biggest mystery is why this stagey stuff was filmed at all, and why a cast of this calibre should have bothered."{{cite web|url=https://www.timeout.com/london/film/out-of-season |title=Out of Season, directed by Alan Bridges | Film review |publisher=Timeout.com |date= 10 September 2012|access-date=13 November 2017}}

Texas Monthly said: "Out of Season cannot be tolerated at any time of year. If ever a project called for an executioner, this was it, and the presence of Redgrave, Robertson, George and the underrated director Alan Bridges, should not fool anyone into thinking that this frail mash note to father-daughter sex is a Certified Art Film."{{cite web|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=jysEAAAAMBAJ&q=out+of+season+redgrave&pg=PA46 |title=Texas Monthly - Google Books |date= February 1976|access-date=13 November 2017}} Film Review Digest Annual wrote: "With Out of Season, it's a shame that so much tender loving care was expended on so uninteresting a film. Whatever it was in Reuben Bercovitch and Eric Bercovici's wan story that intrigued England's gifted Alan Bridges fails to come across."{{cite web|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=h0MNAQAAMAAJ&q=out+of+season+redgrave |title=Film Review Digest Annual - Google Books |date=21 July 2010 |access-date=13 November 2017}}

{{reflist}}

• {{IMDb title|id=0073501|title=Out of Season}}

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Category:1975 films

Category:1975 drama films

Category:British drama films

Category:Films about incest

Category:Films shot at EMI-Elstree Studios

Category:Films shot in Dorset

Category:Films directed by Alan Bridges

Category:Films scored by John Cameron (musician)

Category:1970s English-language films

Category:1970s British films