CINEMA
MARTY. (Odeon.) GIRDED with praise and garlanded with prizes, Marty is, inevitably enough. a slight dis- appointment, for it is not, as we were led to expect, the very best film ever to be fabricated by ,anyone anywhere, but is an above-average picture made appealing by the charm of its story and the sensitive talents of its actors. Written by Paddy Chayefsky, it tells a simple talc, that of an ugly butcher and a plain school- marm who in a world dedicated to glamour seek—through a multitude of hurts—for romance, and who with touching gauche,rie. fearing to believe it can he true, discover love together. Ernest Borgnine gives a wonderful performance as the fat, kindly man who hovers uneasily on the fringes of the local wolf pack, making tentative sorties, always expecting to he rebuffed. 'I think you're the kindest man I've ever met,' says Betsy Blair, and one can share Mr. Borgnine's agony at such a remark, so sick to death is he of being thought kind and good and worthy rather than attractive. Miss Blair, who looks rather like Julie Harris, is also excellent, but her character is not so fully developed; indeed the film needs more of her haunting diffidence to give it true balance.
VIRGINIA GRAHAM
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