by Lisa Hemsley

Created on: June 11, 2010

Alfie is a Londoner and his views on life seem to differ from everyone else, he is not prepared to stick to one woman and settle down. He does have a lady who cooks and cleans for him when he goes around but she knows she will only be his second best. Alfie loves women and believes he has a great life sleeping him way around and meeting high profile women. He gets a good lot of money and confidence from doing this but is he really happy.

Alfie is soon in for a shock when his long suffering woman tells him she is pregnant and Alfie at first tries to get her to get rid of it. After several months Alfie meets his son, but is this enough to make him settle down or is he not ready to give up on his womanising ways?

I was really looking forward to seeing this film as I had wanted to for quite a long time, but I have to say I was very disappointed by the film. The acting was not disappointing but for me the storyline was. I found there was no real story to the film and certainly no real ending and I had expected a lot more from this well known film. I did enjoy some aspects of the film but not enough to say I fully enjoyed watching it.

Michael Caine played the role of Alfie and he was super in the character. He made the role a believable one and I was able to instantly warm and get to know the character. I did not agree with all of his views and certainly not his way of life but there were times in the film when I believed he had changed or was prepared to stop living as he did because he did seem to show genuine emotions but this was not to be and he soon hardened up. I did enjoy how he would look directly at the camera and talk to us, for me this made me feel more part of the film.

There was a lot of other good acting in the film and some of these actors included, Shelly Winters, Jane Asher and Alfie Bass, they each bought something different to the story and did give the story a little bit of much needed depth.

The film was made back in 1966, with this being the year it was set in and this so apparent from the clothes the characters wore and the scenes we got of around London. I did enjoy seeing the old way of life and how basic everything way back in the 60’s and how we have moved on since. The scenes in the hospital and doctor's surgery were an eye opener for me, as there was the lack of equipment and computers and all the notes had to be hand written and it was quite funny to see this being done. The music was a good factor of this film and was quite enjoyable and fitted well into the film.

As this is a film only review there are no bonus features to speak of. The running time of this film is 114 minutes and I did find this was too long. I think this same story could have been told in about 90 minutes without losing too much. I think I would not have started to get bored and lose interest if it had been shortened. The certificate is a 15 and I do agree with this. The film can be bought on DVD for just a few pounds now from both Amazon and EBay.

Overall, I will recommend this film only because hubby said he loved it, whereas I did not enjoy it very much. I found there was no real point to the story and did not like the ending, I did however enjoy the acting from Michael Caine. I would say to watch when on TV, but certainly not one to spend money on.

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