Life at the Top

Ten years ago Joe Lampton calculated his way into a rich family and won. Now he has a desk in his father-in-law's company, two children and a good house. None of it works: his wife is unfaithful, so is he, and what he is being asked to sign at the factory is plainly corrupt. The film is not interested in rising. It is interested in what comes after: at the end of the first film Joe got what he wanted, and this one shows the bill for that victory. He can neither go back where he came from nor find respect where he is. The form is sixties British realism: a northern industrial town, the factory, the club, black-and-white images and an escape to London. Ted Kotcheff directed. It is the sequel to Room at the Top, again from John Braine's novel. Laurence Harvey returned to the part, with Jean Simmons as his wife. The film's best section is the short time Joe spends in London with a woman who works in television: he understands he is a stranger there too, and has no option but to return. Who it is for: people who have seen the first film and want the sequel to a class-climbing story. Who it is not for: anyone expecting a standalone film. It leans entirely on Room at the Top and says very little to a viewer who does not know it.