"Shirley Valentine" was originally a play, which starred Pauline Collins in the title role. After its successful run, the studio did something odd...they actually had Collins (a relative unknown in films) to play the same role. And, as you watch it, you can clearly see that the style is that of a play...with Shirley talking to the audience on occasion like you would much more likely see in a play.

Shirley is a 40-something housewife who is in a funk. Her adult children are indifferent to her and her husband is no longer her lover but a total jerk who emotionally abuses and neglects her. Eventually, she gets fed up with her go nowhere life and takes up a friend's offer to go to the Greek island of Mykanos for a vacation away from the family. However, her friend soon hooks up with a man...leaving Shirley completely on her own. So what's next? See the film.

The main reason I saw this film is that I have really enjoyed watching Tom Conti in films and he co-stars in the movie...though you don't see him until rather late in the film. Now I am not complaining...even without him the film would have been lovely as well as wistful and sad. My heart really went out to Shirley and her plight. As for Conti? Oddly, he plays a Greek man...but does it well.

So is it any good? In many ways, yes. Perhaps the reason I liked it more is that I, too, am middle aged and appreciated her struggle. Now, this isn't to say I loved everything about the film. One scene in particular was poorly done, as it lacked subtlety and was not written well. In the scene, Shirley is enjoying a local Greek restaurant and it seems like ALL the British tourists are obnoxious and boorish pigs who seem to hate everything about Greece. When you travel you do occasionally meet folks like this (I met a couple on cruises),but so many in one place being THAT awful? No...this is making a point with a sledgehammer! But while I have a reasonable complaint there, I really enjoyed everything else about the movie...so one scene didn't at all ruin it for me. I also wasn't thrilled with the message to have the affair....I say divorce the jerk and then have the affair! Overall, an important film that really speaks to a problem seldom talked about in movies. Not surprisingly, the production staff who did this film also made "Educating Rita"...a film with many of the same themes and about a middle-aged lady who decides to reinvent herself.

By the way, if you ever get to Mykanos (and nearby Delos),I cannot imagine anyone hating it in any way. The place is gorgeous, the water the bluest I've ever seen and the food was simply amazing. Do yourself a favor...take a trip there just like Shirley did!

Pauline Collins is a 42-year-old Liverpudlian housewife who talks to the walls. One day she gives husband Bernard Hill's Thursday steak to the hound of the snooty lady across the street; she has been keeping it on a vegetarian diet. Hill explodes when she gives him fish and chips; that's Tuesday's meal. Her friend Alison Steadman wins a trip for two to Greece, takes Miss Collins along and abandons her to her own devices. She has no issue with that. She enjoys Greek food, drinks retsina and has an affair with tavern owner Tom Conti.

In her second movie role -- she had played a stripper in an exploitation film in 1966 -- Miss Collins recreates her Tony-winning role in the stage's one-hander. Given the bareness of the actual stage production, there is a shift of tone, from fantasy to anomie, and the other characters are given little depth, Miss Collins seems to be the character she plays in this gender-switching variation on ZORBA THE GREEK. If it also seems reminiscent of EDUCATING RITA, that's because Willy Russell wrote both plays, produced their transfers to the screen under the same director, Lewis Gilbert. Miss Collins is, as you might guess from the above, wonderful.

Shirley Valentine (Pauline Collins) is a bored housewife. She's not simply breaking the 4th wall. She's actually talking to the wall. Her husband Joe has grown cold with a set schedule and she doesn't have many friends left from the old days. They're alone after their starving poet son Brian and daughter Millandra moved out. Her friend 'feminist' divorcée Jane wins two tickets to Greece and brings Shirley along with her. At school, she had hoped to be an air hostess but she was always put down by the headmistress. She became a rebel jealous of her school rival goodie Marjorie Majors. She meets Marjorie again as adults with surprising revelations. She fights with Joe and her daughter. Jane abandons her for a guy once they're on the plane. She meets local bar owner Costas (Tom Conti).

This is based on an one-woman play and this is very much about that one woman. It all rests on Pauline Collins' shoulders and she is absolutely winning. She takes up the screen. She is charming, funny, and a fully-formed woman. Some of the side characters can be too broad. There are a couple of big laughs but mostly it's Pauline Collins' humanity that shines through.