Ursula Jeans

Cecil Parker

Joan Hopkins

Derek Bond

Thora Hird

Bill Owen

Lana Morris

John Stone

Digby Wolfe

Marian Spencer

Kynaston Reeves

Basil Appleby

Kathleen Boutall

Dorothy Bramhall

Campbell Cotts

Helen Goss

Marjorie Gresley

Gladys Henson

Vi Kaley

Eleanor Summerfield

Merle Tottenham

Joan White

Esther McCracken

Paul Soskin

Herbert Smith

Arthur Wilkinson

Erwin Hillier

Michael C. Chorlton

Joseph Sterling

Maude Spector

Alex Vetchinsky

Tony Sforzini

Vivienne Walker

Geoffrey Rodway

Trevor Crole-Rees

Basil Newall

George Pitcher

John Cook

Desmond Dew

Dennis Gurney

Kenneth Heeley-Ray

George Croll

George Willows

Eric Besche

Tilly Day

Roy Ward Baker

Anthony Hearne

Fred Ryan

Drama

The Weaker Sex

J. Arthur Rank Organisation

Two Cities Films

United Kingdom

CinemaSerf

I found the title of this rather classy wartime drama a bit misleading. Though it is told from the perspective of the widowed "Martha" (Ursula Jeans) and focusses on the stay at home elements of fighting during WWII - there isn't really anything weak about her dedication to her duties; nor of those of her counterparts. She plays her character with poignancy, dealing with the day-to-day trials and tribulations reconciling her work and her home - in which she billets RN commander "Geoffrey" (Cecil Parker) and sailor "Roddy" whilst her own two children are away serving. From a narrative perspective it climaxes with the D-Day landings and, intercut with War Office actuality, conveys a genuine sense of the fraught anticipation of those at home. Once the war has been won, the story rather peters out - a few fun jibes at the pains of rationing, and that most British of all things - the queue; and there is a degree of stoic, stiff upper lip-ness about the attitudes that makes the characterisations plausible and engaging, but it does slip a little into melodrama. There are a few welcome cameos from Thora Hird as their housekeeper (and, briefly, from Bill Owen with whom she starred in "Last of the Summer Wine" some 60-odd years later) and Kynaston Reeves. The story isn't all plain sailing: grim reality raises it's ugly head now and again, but that is handled subtly and isn't dwindled upon - helping the proceedings march along at a decent pace. I expect this went down well with audiences in 1948 - it's good.

English