Room at the Top (1959)
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Ruthless young working-class Englishman Laurence Harvey takes a job in a North Country village controlled by millionaire Donald Wolfit. Harvey resents Wolfit's class consciousness and vows to rise to the top by wooing the millionaire's daughter, Heather Sears. Meanwhile he has an affair with Frenchwoman Simone Signoret. Though he regards Signoret as a mere self-gratifying conquest, she takes their romance seriously enough to kill herself when Harvey impregnates Field. Only as he leaves the chapel after marrying the millionaire's daughter does Harvey that his "smart" marriage, coupled with the guarantee of a fabulous business career, has been attained at the cost of his soul. Based on the novel by John Braine, Room at the Top was one of the most successful films of the British angry-young-man school; it later spawned two sequels, as well as a weekly TV series. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
Complete Cast:
- Laurence Harvey - Joe Lampton
- Heather Sears - Susan Brown
- Ambrosine Phillpotts - Mrs. Brown
- Hermione Baddeley - Elspeth
- John Westbrook - Jack Wales
- Mary Peach - June Samson
- Anne Leon - Janet
- Avril Elgar - Miss Gilchrist
- Miriam Karlin - Gertrude
- April Olrich - Mavis
- Basil Dignam - Priest
- Yvonne Buckingham - Girl at Window
- Delena Kidd - Eva
- John Welsh - Mayor
- Ruth Kettlewell - Thespians member
- Simone Signoret - Alice Aisgill
- Donald Wolfit - Mr. Brown
- Donald Houston - Charlie Soames
- Raymond Huntley - Mr. Hoylake
- Allan Cuthbertson - George Aisgill
- Thelma Ruby - Miss Breith
- Wendy Craig - Joan
- Beatrice Varley - Aunt
- Richard Pasco - Teddy
- Everley Gregg - Mayoress
- Paul Whitsun-Jones - Man at Bar
- Doreen Dawn - High-stepping Girl
- Stephen Jack - Darnley
- Wilfred Lawson - Uncle Nat
- Ian Hendry - Cyril
- Director(s):
- Jack Clayton
- Writer(s):
- Neil Paterson
- Producer(s):
- James Woolf, John Woolf
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- 1958 - Room at the Top - British Academy of Film and Television Arts - Best Film - Any Source
- 1958 - Room at the Top - British Academy of Film and Television Arts - Best Foreign Actress
- 1959 - Room at the Top - Golden Globe - Best Foreign Film
- 1959 - Room at the Top - Hollywood Foreign Press Association - Best Foreign Film
- 1959 - Room at the Top - National Board of Review - Best Actress
