Intimate Relations

Julie Walters - Marjorie Beasley
Rupert Graves - Harold Guppy
Matthew Walker - Stanley Beasley
Laura Sadler - Joyce Beasley
Holly Aird - Deirdre
Les Dennis - Maurice Guppy
Elizabeth McKechnie - Iris Guppy
James Aiden - George
Michael Bertenshaw - Mr. Pugh
Judy Clifton - Mrs. Fox-Davies
Amanda Holden - Pamela

Quirky black comedy starring Julie Walters and Rupert Graves in a tale of obsession, sexual abuse and murder purporting to be inspired by real events. First-time writer and director Philip Goodhew’s well-made film is an intelligent exploration of a dysfunctional family and the hypocritical moral attitudes that pervaded post-war England, and the damage wreaked when repressed lust turns to violent desperation.

The bliss of a post-war Fifties provincial coastal town is shattered when merchant sailor Harold Guppy (Rupert Graves) disembarks a ship and visits the home of his long-lost brother Maurice (Les Dennis). The reunion is lukewarm, for Maurice's frosty wife Iris (Elizabeth McKechnie) is suspicious of Harold and reluctant to welcome him into her home. Unable to stay with his brother, the handsome Harold takes up lodgings with Mr (Matthew Walker) and Mrs Beasley (Julie Walters). Marjorie’s boozy husband Stanley, a WWI veteran who lost his leg during the war, disgusts the frustrated housewife so she makes it her business to seduce the vulnerable Harold while maintaining the illusion of proper family values.

But that proves even harder to uphold when her amorous 13-year-old daughter Joyce (Laura Sadler) discovers the affair and joins the couple in bed. Soon the weak-willed Harold is trapped in a world of tea, sympathy, blackmail and deceit - the victim of both mother and daughter. Harold obtains short respite by signing on with the Army and getting a girlfriend, but Marjorie threatens to inform the police he abused a minor if he doesn’t allow her to buy him out of armed forces and return to her home. Howard accordingly returns to the Beasley household with a look of resignation. As tensions within the household mount the only way out of the peculiar ménage à trios is murder.