Independent Films, Film Profiles

Sunday Bloody Sunday (film)
by John Schlesinger

Sunday Bloody Sunday is a 1971 British film directed by John Schlesinger. It tells the story of a young bisexual designer (Murray Head) and his simultaneous relationships with a recruitment consultant (Glenda Jackson) and a Jewish doctor (Peter Finch). The movie also stars Dame Peggy Ashcroft and Jon Finch.The film is noteworthy for being one of the first widely distributed major motion pictures to show two men making love.A Jewish doctor, Daniel Hirsh (Finch) and a young woman, Alex Greville (Jackson) are both involved in a love triangle with the same person, Bob Elkin (Head). Not only are Hirsh and Greville aware that Elkin is seeing the other, but they know each other through mutual friends. Despite this, they are willing to put up with the situation through fear of losing Elkin, who switches freely between them.For Greville, the relationship is bound up with a growing disillusionment about her life, failed marriage and uneasy childhood. For Hirsh, it represents an escape from the repressed nature of his Jewish upbringing. Both realise the lack of permanence about their situation, and it is only when Elkin decides to leave the country that they both come face to face (for the first time in the narrative, and at the very end). Despite their opposed situations, both come to realize that it is time to move on.The film is significant for its time period, in that Finch's character is normal and relatively well adjusted (aside from his being distraught over the impending departure of Elkin), and is not particularly upset by or obsessed with his homosexuality.