Product Details

• Actors: Laurence Olivier, Simone Signoret, Sarah Miles, Terence Stamp, Hugh Griffith
• Directors: Peter Glenville
• Format: NTSC
• Language: English
• Region: All Regions
• Aspect Ratio: 1.77:1
• Number of discs: 1
• Rated: NR (Not Rated)
• Studio: WB
• DVD Release Date: December 17, 2009
• Run Time: 113 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• ASIN: B003156IHK
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #120,934 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)
• For more information about "TERM OF TRIAL" visit the Internet Movie Database (IMDb)

Editorial Reviews

Graham Weir is a middle-aged schoolmaster. Shirley Taylor is his adoring 16-year-old pupil. She offers herself, he gently rejects her and she retaliates with a charge of indecent assault. Acting legend Laurence Olivier and film-debuting Sarah Miles portray teacher and student in Term of Trial, Peter (Becket) Glenville's provocative film notable in its time for its frank sexual theme...and notable in ours for Olivier's authoritative portrait of an unauthoritative man, one too good - or too fearful - to misuse another human being. Simone Signoret, like Olivier an Academy Award® winner, plays Weir's restless wife, whose disdain for her husband leads to a stunning denouement. Three lives. One fateful lie.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Laurence Olivier tour de force as..., June 12, 2010

By 

Jane Pensive "a film fan" - See all my reviews

This review is from: TERM OF TRIAL (DVD-R)

the ordinary man. The great Olivier, known for his ability to project dangerous sexuality ('Wuthering Heights," "Rebecca") is staggeringly poignant as a pacifistic, slightly alcoholic, sweet, school teacher. He loves his somewhat overbearing, maturely sexy wife, and he has sympathy and empathy for his students who want to overcome their grindingly depressing working class backgrounds. Olivier must put up with the casual cruelty and imbecility of his supervisors, as well as the contempt of his wife who thinks he should have a bigger, better and more lucrative career.

Hounded by colleagues and ignorant toughs he forces himself to adminster a well-earned corporal punishment to a hulking bully of a student (Terence Stamp in his first movie role). For his trouble he is assaulted by Stamp's father, and unjustly criticised by his headmaster. He voluntarily tutors a vixenish 15 year old student (Sarah Miles in her wonderful debut) who wants to improve her grammar so she can have a secretarial job above her station in life. She can't afford to pay so he teaches her for free. Again, for his trouble she falls in love with him, tries to seduce him, and wrongly accuses him of lechery and seduction. He stands trial, and even though exonerated, his headmaster suggests he leave his job because his unwarranted notoriety is making things hot for said headmaster. In the end, Olivier's teacher has learned something about the wiles of humanity and battles his boss and his wife back into submission.

This grim "kitchen sink" era drama is absorbing. The cinematography is appropriately gritty. Simone Signoret as the disappointed wife is domineering and surprisingly alluring all at the same time. She has contempt for her husband as well as love and desire, but she sees him as ultimately boring and inconsequential. She nor anyone else, except the girl who persecutes him, can see his fineness, refinement, kindness and tenderness. Don't miss this British gem, full of irony, inconsistency, disappointment and wierd triumph.