Word: courtenay
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...Billy, Tom Courtenay (The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner] seems the apotheosis of misspent youth. Director John Schlesinger often takes fancy too literally, weighing it down with sets and costumes, and Courtenay's hectic inner life is hilarious all by itself. The movie soars when he tosses an imaginary hand grenade as the ultimate solution of some minor social disgrace. When he lolls around his boss's office practicing a speech of resignation, Courtenay steers an unpredictable course from Churchill imita tions to doubletalk to mere gibberish, and brings off moments of pluperfect screen comedy...
Unfortunately, the hero is too palpably prolier-than-thou, his case is too obviously rigged. Fortunately, Actor Courtenay is excellent (TIME, Sept. 14). As he plays the hero, his chest is phthisical, his voice is a noise among incessant city noises, his face is as hard and blank as city pavement, his eyes are as dark and empty as broken windows in an abandoned mill...
Expanded from a short story by Alan Sillitoe, Loneliness recites the lugubrious case history of a mill-town ragamuffin (Tom Courtenay) who winds up as a Borstal boy. As he reaches reform school, the hero is met by "the Guv'nor" (Michael Redgrave). "You're here to work hard and play hard," his nibs announces with an intolerably self-righteous smirk. "We're here to try and make something...
Bitten Finney. Bright, miserably shy and introverted, Courtenay himself is the living opposite of the boy he plays on film. His father spent his working lifetime painting trawlers. "The only way he could have earned less than he did was not to have worked at all," says Tom. But in stead of filling him with resentment, Courtenay's humble beginnings inspired him. Under Britain's weed-killing series of national examinations, only one in thousands from a background like Courtenay's ever receives more than an elementary education. Courtenay...
...Courtenay's merit as a star was not secured until he replaced Albert Finney last year in the West End's long-running Billy Liar. Critics who had slobbered all over Finney for his dazzling performance in the role watched Courtenay do it, then turned and bit Finney. Finney's great performance, they decided, had been "out side the play" compared with Courtenay's wellsprings of insight...