It Always Rains on Sunday DVD Review

A snapshot of post-war, working class austerity, It Always Rains on Sunday, released in 1947, makes its way back onto cinema screens as part of the BFI’s Ealing retrospective, and is granted a special edition DVD release into the bargain.

Robert Hamer’s engaging drama, is arguably much less well known than Ealing’s comedic offerings, but its relative anonymity compared to the studio’s later offerings hides a stylistic and thematic ingenuity that prefigures not just nourish thrillers which would flourish shortly after, but also the working-class graft of the British New Wave.

Trapped in a joyless existence of bleak domesticity, dejected housewife Rose (Googie Withers) finds her dull life upset by the sudden reappearance of old flame, Tommy (John McCallum), on the run from police having recently escaped from Dartmoor Prison. As the routine of a typical Sunday unfolds around her, Rose desperately attempts to keep the presence of her former lover a secret from her husband, stepdaughters, and the cluttered, tangled lives of the street’s inhabitants: petty thieves, inquisitive journalists in search of a story, prying policemen and wheeler-dealer businessmen whose lives all contribute to a neat tapestry of supporting and intruding narrative threads.

It’s a bit of a conundrum to explain why It Always Rains on Sunday is not regularly included amongst the pantheon of Ealing greats. Perhaps the plain truth is that it was too much, too soon; a dangerous, determined piece of cinema intent on confronting the problems and realities of a post-war Britain, rather than playing on past glories.

The stylish Noir-tinged finale, the breathless chase through the Stratford train yard, faultlessly photographed by Douglas Slocombe would seem to echo that most illustrious of British thrillers, The Third Man, were it not for the fact that Robert Hamer’s daunting, dizzying chase through the shadows pre-dates Carol Reed’s masterpiece by two years. The low-key grind of daily life amongst the bomb-scarred terraces of the East End also provides us with a glimpse of the kind of social realism that wouldn’t be fully exulted for a decade or so.

If you are already familiar with this largely unheralded gem, do yourself a favour and reacquaint yourself. If not, find it and discover a wonderfully progressive masterwork of British cinema.

Chris Banks(@Chris_in_2D)

★★★★1/2

Rating:PG
DVD Re-release Date:12th November 2012 (UK)
Directed By:Robert Hamer
Cast: Googie Withers, Jack Warner , John McCallum
Buy:It Always Rains On Sunday (Digitally Remastered) [Blu-ray] / DVD