Suzanna was born in 1960 and was discovered by the film-maker Claude Whatham in children’s theatre. She later attended the Anna Scher Theatre School becoming one of its first alumni to make a name for herself. Suzanna does not court celebrity and took a conscious decision to move out of mainstream cinema into more independent productions in the mid-80s. In 1993 her son Lowell was born and she has acted less frequently since but is still working.
1. Swallows And Amazons (1973)
Suzanna is billed as Zannah Hamilton in this possibly because her character’s name is Susan in this adaptation of Arthur Ransome’s perennially popular children’s novel. Suzanna was 12 when this was filmed but is so skinny she could pass for younger unlike her co-star Kit Seymour (Nancy) who looks too old and slightly uncomfortable with her role. Susan is the second oldest of four children (including the unfortunately named Titty ) who are spending the 1929 summer holidays in the Lake District with their mother (Virginia McKenna ). Being on the edge of a lake with an island (Derwentwater in the film, an amalgam of Coniston Water and Windermere in the book) they spend their time camping and sailing a small boat (the Swallow) and indulging in a pirate fantasy with a rival pair of sisters (who sail the Amazon) and their cantankerous uncle (Ronald Fraser) who wants peace and quiet to write a book on his houseboat.
I found it a surprisingly enjoyable film. It re-captures a lost world of childhood innocence with not a P.A.Y.G.O. mobile or Nintendo in sight. That apart it doesn’t seem all that dated, woods, tents and boats having an eternal appeal to those fortunate enough to have access to them. There isn’t that much of a plot – the burglary story seems a curious intrusion – it’s just a wallow in nostalgia for happier days and beautifully shot. For an adult viewer there is the amusement of seeing the children and their mother break every health and safety taboo in sight ; this has got to be Richard Littlejohn’s favourite film. The children set sail without lifejackets, stay out all night, boil water from the lake, play with fireworks and Mum doesn’t bat an eyelid.
Another reason it doesn’t date is that, Suzanna apart, none of the children have gone on to an acting career. Sophie Neville, probably the pick of the bunch as younger sister Titty ( she and Suzanna are actually the same age ) went on to be a TV producer but is now an artist and naturalist. Suzanna already has that air of cool self-possession she brought to many of her adult roles. Fraser is probably not who Ransome would have chosen to play the character modelled on himself and his cartoon-ish face and voice do threaten to take the film into Here Come The Double Deckers - slapstick territory. On the other hand, he does neutralise what would otherwise be a queasy moment when his pubescent neice Nancy complains of his lack of attention to her.
Though it didn’t have the same impact as The Railway Children - small dinghys aren’t as charismatic as steam engines – it still gets an airing on TV every now and then and is worth catching.
2 Tess (1979)
Suzanna's first adult film role came six years later in Roman Polanski's "Tess" where she plays Izz Hewitt, the titular heroine's guileless best friend. It's only a small role but Suzanna plays it to perfection eliciting real sympathy when her honesty gets in the way of her heart's desire.
My enjoyment of the film ( which was belatedly made at the suggestion of Polanski's murdered wife Sharon Tate) is still marred by having had to study the vastly over-rated novel for my A Levels. Polanski is very faithful to Hardy (albeit condensing the middle portion somewhat ) even to the point of rendering the utterly preposterous scene where the blood of a single person starts dripping through the ceiling below. Where Hardy left the woodland scene ambiguous it's clear that Polanski envisages a rape rather than a seduction.
Notwithstanding the dedication to Sharon, Polanski gave the title role to his then-current squeeze, Natassia Kinski. She isn't great and her accent's well wide of the mark but when the character herself is so unconvincing as a flesh and blood woman rather than a cipher for Hardy's rage at Victorian hypocrisy it doesn't really matter. The male leads, Peter Firth as the weak, hypocritical Angel and Leigh Lawson as the cynical bounder Alec are both good but the real stars are the Oscar-winning cinematographers Geoffrey Unsworth and Ghislain Cloquet who sumptuously recreate rural Dorset in France (due of course to Polanski's ongoing legal travails).
3 The Wildcats of St Trinians (1980)
Suzanna then took a backwards step and returned to school (she was 19 at the time) for a revival of the St Trinian's franchise fourteen years after the last one. This mix of supposed political satire (on trade union power ) and Carry On smut certainly didn't find favour with fans of the original films and I can see why. It's never been released on DVD and I'm wondering if one of it's stars is paying to keep it that way ( my money's on Maureen Lipman ).
This film really is dire; I'm struggling to come up with any redeeming feature. The "plot" is nonsensical, a cabal of rebellious schoolgirls already having things their own way decide to set themselves up as a trade union with the encouragement of Flash Harry ( Joe Melia ) their shoe cleaner ( who also masquerades as a Chinese restauranteur purely for the purpose of the odd racist gag ). Their plan to spread the revolution involves kidnapping an Arab princess from another school which leads to various wacky schemes by the civil service to retrieve her.
The comedy is feeble at best; there's some lame slapstick - blowing up the chemistry lab, men losing their trousers, that sort of thing - but most of the film actually consists of long, boring scenes of people scheming against each other. As for the politics - stick with DVDs of Not The Nine O Clock News or Citizen Smith for a flavour of the period, you won't learn anything useful here. There's some tame titillation with ubiquitous busty blonde Debbie Linden crowbarred in as a very unlikely schoolgirl. This leads to the only (unintentionally) funny scene where she and a few other nubiles are dancing around in Hawaiian skirts in what is clearly a Force 9 gale.
Suzanna has a few lines as the mouthy mole switched with the princess but her appearance is more notable for an appalling dead skunk hairstyle than any opportunity to show her acting talent. The girls ( all well over-age ) are interchangeable; the only one who stands out is Veronica Quilligan ( later to make her mark as Anthony Sher's student squeeze in The History Man ) as the ringleader. Among the adults you'd have to give Michael Hordern as the Minister a few marks for his professionalism amid this nonsense whereas Lipman takes the opportunity to "treat" us to her impersonation of Janet Street-Porter and top-billed Sheila Hancock is unwatchable as the one-eyed Dutch headmistress.
Quite simply one of the worst films I've ever seen.
4 Brimstone and Treacle (1982)
Suzanna showed her willingness to take risks by appearing in the film version of Dennis Potter's notorious play which had been produced then banned by the BBC who took fright at its controversial denouement. She plays Patricia the apparently brain-damaged girl at the centre of the film. Cynics might suggest that even lying prone in a coma for much of the action, Suzanna knew she could out-act one of her co-stars.
The story concerns a young man Martin (Sting) who cons his way into the home of a middle-aged couple, the Bateses (Dehnolm Elliott and Joan Plowright) whose marriage is fraying under the strains of caring for their daughter (Suzanna) , now disabled physically and mentally after a hit and run. Mrs Bates is fervently religious and still hopes for a miracle recovery while Mr Bates is now a guilt-ridden atheist with his own reasons for fearing such an event.
Potter adapted his own play to get the story out after the BBC sat on the original version. The overt occult references are removed to make it more ambiguous whether Martin is a devil, angel with an unorthodox approach or simply a parasitic opportunist with a talent for spotting people's weaknesses. Potter and director Richard Loncraine were able to go a bit further with the sex scenes and re-cast everyone but Elliott who appears in both versions. It's an economical film without any superfluous padding.
Anyone familiar with Potter's work will recognise the familiar tropes of sex and spirituality. Here he seems to be on the side of the angels with Plowright's selfless but suffering mother by a long way the most sympathetic character. She is excellent but Elliott is something else ; the scenes of him at work hacking out doggerel in which he no longer believes are almost too painful to watch. As a portrait of a man drowning in self-loathing it's unbeatable. He also features in what is probably the grimmest sex scene ever committed to celluloid.
And so we come to Mr Sumner. Who on earth thought he was the best candidate for the lead role ? The material was always going to get them an 18 certificate so his teen appeal (which he'd largely lost by this time anyway) wasn't going to put any more bums on seats . I suppose it did generate some extra publicity and took care of the soundtrack (which is pretty good by the way). Actually he's not that bad. He certainly has screen presence and achieves the contrast between Martin's public and private faces well but in such rarified company he was always going to be found wanting.
As for Suzanna she does well in a pretty thankless role. She has little real dialogue and we never learn much about her character but she is convincing physically. She reveals all in the controversial sex scenes ( looking less skinny than usual ) although they are short and to the point, never prurient.
It's a thought-provoking drama, ( Dudley Sutton's little cameo at the end is a head-scratcher ) which is well-resolved but it's the picture of the Bateses each locked in their own private hell unable to help each other that stays with you.
5 1984 (1984)
Now we come to Suzanna's most famous film role. It was fairly inevitable that someone would produce a film version of Orwell's novel to come out in the titular year and so this British adaptation appeared. It received two rather unwelcome publicity boosts firstly when Richard Burton died thus making this his last film appearance and then when a very public row broke out over the musical score between Eurythmics ( who had been brought in by the film's financial backers , Virgin Records ) and director Michael Radford's choice , Dominic Mulroney. Although both are credited in the film titles , different versions of the film have been released, in some of which Eurythmics' s contributions have been excised completely.
Virgin also resisted Radford's desire to shoot in black and white and a compromise wherein much of the colour was bleached out giving the film a distinctively grainy look was reached.
The film also stays true to a 1940s aesthetic partly in deference to the wishes of Orwell's widow Sonia on selling the film rights though she had died in 1980. The dowdy look of the film does however exacerbate the major difficulty facing any adapter of Orwell's most famous book ; it's more of an unrelentingly pessimistic tract than a novel with a not overly sympathetic "hero" whose tenuous optimism is resoundingly beat out of him. How do you persuade an audience they want to watch something so bleak ? To his credit Radford managed to resist any pressure for a Brighton Rock - style "happy" ending and stayed pretty faithful to the book.
For anyone unfamiliar with the source material , Winston Smith ( John Hurt ) lives in a war-torn totalitarian state Oceania, in joyless squalor while he works as a propagandist in the Ministry of Truth dedicated to constantly revising historical records in line with current Party ideology. Though a Party worker himself he is constantly under surveillance for suspected thought crime of which he is actually guilty, keeping a diary to record his heretical thoughts. He is approached for a tryst by another party worker Julia ( Suzanna ) which leads to a further offence , sexcrime, and also by a Party boss O Brien ( Burton ) who lends him a forbidden book by supposed enemy of the state Goldstein. Winston imagines his lot to be improving but his problems are only just beginning.
Hurt was perhaps an obvious choice to play Winston with his pained features particularly as the character spends the last third of the film being tortured in one way or another and he is as good as you'd expect. Burton is also excellent as the coldly menacing O Brien with none of his usual theatrics, a fine note on which to depart. There's also a good cameo from a young Gregor Fisher as Winston's naive colleague Parsons.
Suzanna takes to her starring role with aplomb. It takes a leap of imagination to believe she would be sexually attracted to Hurt but she pulls it off and doesn't seem self-conscious in the nude scenes. In fact she is stark naked for at least half her screen time and you get plenty of opportunity to examine her small but perky breasts and unshaved bush and armpits. Her skinny body underlines the privations suffered by these characters but unlike Hurt she has the vitality of youth. It's a shame she's largely absent from the last half hour.
The film did moderately well at the box office and won an Evening Standard British Film Award but has largely been forgotten. It was perhaps unlucky to come out at the same time as Terry Gilliam's fresher take on bureaucratic nightmares Brazil and its release also coincided with the UK visit of a young Russian politician Mikhail Gorbachev who was to do more than anyone to make Orwell seem something of a false prophet. Personally I think his time will come round again; whether I want to be around for that is another matter.
5 Wetherby (1985)
Most of the action takes place in the small Yorkshire market town of Wetherby which I visited a couple of times in 1993 ( while walking the West Yorkshire Way ). Important from medieval times as the halfway point on the Great North Road between London and Edinburgh , it has since been by-passed by the A1 and administratively absorbed by the city of Leeds to which it is connected by a ribbon of suburban development. On all other sides the town is bordered by flat fields stretching for miles and I think that sense of isolation and dislocation is the reason Hare ( no Yorkshireman ) chose it as the setting for this curious little drama.
The central character is Jean Travers ( Vanessa Redgrave ) an unmarried, seemingly content, middle-aged English teacher living alone in the Yorkshire countryside. She holds a small dinner party for her friends but the following day one of the guests John Morgan ( Tim McInerny ) returns to her home and rather inconsiderately blows his brains out in her kitchen.
The rest of the film is concerned with explaining this event and its effects on Jean at all levels using many flashbacks and one or two red herrings along the way.
This is a thoughtful drama with little action and not much sex and it occasionally drags a little but there is much to enjoy with some top class performances and genuine psychological insights. It seems to me that the main themes are middle-aged loneliness and disillusionment and the concomitant jealousy of youth crystallised in the figure of Stanley Pilborough ( Ian Holm ) the oft-drunk solicitor sunk in a pit of self-loathing. Similarly Jean's current day doubts are highlighted by the simple but effective device of having Joely Richardson ( briefly topless at one point ) playing her younger lovesick self.
Where I think the film comes a bit unstuck is in trying to relate these universal themes to the specific period in which it was made. The scenes in which Jean tries to convince herself and her class of mulleted teenagers that education still matters seem disconnected as does the one where she drives past some feral kids having a street bonfire. Living just down the road in Leeds when this came out, there's nothing that resonates except the odd familiar landmark. Hare also can't resist making a direct reference to Mrs T which would be risible if not delivered by Holm.
There's also some sloppiness in the narrative. There's no explanation as to how Jean can afford to live in a 17th century farm house in the Dales on a comprehensive teacher's salary and the plot seems to necessitate Suzanna's character being both a student in Essex and a library assistant in Wetherby at the same time . Another weak link is Stuart Wilson ( my mum's favourite actor ) as the under-empoyed , over-cerebral police inspector Langden investigating the case. More comfortable as a rugged hero in spy thrillers Wilson looks all at sea here struggling with lines like " a central disfiguring blankness " ( unwittingly describing his own performance ) and his domestic storyline involving a completely wasted Penny Downie is a superfluous blind alley.
Otherwise the performances are excellent. I'm no great fan of the Redgraves but both Vanessa and Joely are faultless, the latter exuding a warmth and vulnerability that I've not seen before. As mentioned above Holm is devastatingly good, Judi Dench is predictably perfect though not really stretched and McInerny (with only Blackadder on his cv at this point ) warms up well for a career playing disturbed characters. There's also an early film role ( his first but for an obscure Polish film in the mid-70s ) for Tom Wilkinson as a nerdy but dislikeable teacher who is embarrassed by his wife's intellectual inferiority.
Suzanna plays Karen, a former acquaintance of Morgan's who, by a poorly explained contrivance comes to stay with Jean after the funeral. Despite the fact that her character has to bear too much weight as the embodiment of the writer's dismay at self-absorbed and disaffected youth, Suzanna handles her part well being both beguiling and exasperating and, in her final scene, scarily vicious. She doesn't have to bare all here though a couple of scenes in thin white underwear are sexy enough.
Despite its obvious flaws this is a film I'd recommend.
6 Out Of Africa (1985)
Suzanna has a small part in this Oscar-winning epic as a young ex-pat named Felicity based on the real-life adventurer Beryl Markham ( still alive when the film was made , perhaps the reason her name was changed ).
This wasn't a film that attracted me when it came out and I remember Barry Norman being a bit ambivalent about it so I watched it without high expectations. It's about the African sojourn ( 1914 - 1931 ) of the Danish writer Karen Blixen ( Meryl Streep). She contracts a marriage of convenience with Swedish baron Bror von Blixen ( Klaus Maria Brandauer ) which involves financing a farm in Africa but when the partnership founders through his neglect and philandering , she switches her affections to free spirited game hunter Denys Finch Hatton ( Robert Redford ). Her adventures out in the bush and philanthropy directed at the natives are also covered.
Although it won the Best Picture Oscar ( albeit during a rather fallow and troubled decade for Hollywood ) it's a frustrating film. The cinematography is awesome , Syd,ney Pollack making full use of the fabulous Kenyan scenery and wildlife and for the most part the acting is superb but it's emotionally hollow for such a long film. The viewer remains unmoved by the various tragedies. Partly that's because the main characters are part of a privileged caste but a lot of it must be attributed to Pollack's major mistake, the casting of Redford. As well as being the wrong nationality and age , Redford had semi-retired from acting since his directorial success with Ordinary People and there's a certain disengaged air about his performance. His early scenes have an unfortunate air of Crocodile Dundee ( released the following year ) about them while his core scenes with Streep are adult and well-scripted but lacking in passion. Similarly Hatton's relatively advanced views about colonisation are not delivered with any conviction.
Redford's failings are thrown into relief by a superb Oscar-nominated performance by Brandauer as the errant but fundamentally honest husband and Barry Norman suspected his scenes had been trimmed for fear he would eclipse Redford. Certainly the opening scene explaining the marital arrangements seems oddly rushed and confusing given the languid pace of so much of the film ( particularly the protracted ending ). Streep was also Oscar-nominated and she is pretty faultless in her portrayal of a not completely sympathetic character. A young Michael Kitchen is also very good as Redford's business partner and his physical decline is well realised by the make-up artist. Suzanna does well enough as Blixen's energetic but gauche friend but she's only in a few scenes and they all seem pretty superfluous.
Redford's failings are thrown into relief by a superb Oscar-nominated performance by Brandauer as the errant but fundamentally honest husband and Barry Norman suspected his scenes had been trimmed for fear he would eclipse Redford. Certainly the opening scene explaining the marital arrangements seems oddly rushed and confusing given the languid pace of so much of the film ( particularly the protracted ending ). Streep was also Oscar-nominated and she is pretty faultless in her portrayal of a not completely sympathetic character. A young Michael Kitchen is also very good as Redford's business partner and his physical decline is well realised by the make-up artist. Suzanna does well enough as Blixen's energetic but gauche friend but she's only in a few scenes and they all seem pretty superfluous.
7 Devil’s Paradise (aka Des Teufels Paradies) (1987)
Suzanna side-stepped Hollywood for her next film a West German production although the language is English. It's an adaptation of Conrad's Victory ( a slightly surprising choice since there's a fair amount of anti-German sentiment in the book ) the story of a loner in the Far East brought up to avoid emotional engagement who is ruined by two acts of kindness. Although re-titled and brought forward a couple of decades, it's still quite recognisable as the book I first read in 1989.
In this version Escher ( Jurgen Prochnow) is a white man in the Far East tending the remains of a failed mining venture on a remote island after his partner Quinn ( Tony Doyle ) is killed whilst recklessly antagonising the natives. On a visit to a larger island, he encounters a distressed young musician Julia ( Suzanna ) playing in a hotel band which is a front for prostitution organised by the corrupt and lecherous Schomberg ( Mario Adorf ). He arranges her escape to his island where she begins to thaw him out. Unfortunately, their idyll is invaded by malevolent playboy Mr Jones ( Sam Waterston ) bent on disruption.
This is quite a lean economic film so much is condensed. Escher's aherence to Schopenhauer's philosophy is only hinted at and Jones' s psychotic misogyny is jettisoned to bring him into the story sooner. The development of Escher's relationship with Julia on the island is limited to a handful of scenes. It's also less bleak than Conrad's novel with a relatively happy ending.
Nonetheless on its own terms this is a well-made adventure film with interesting characters and much of the credit should go to the cast. Prochnow doesn't get to say much but his brooding screen presence makes the other characters' fascination with him believable. Waterston ( having re-grown his Heaven's Gate moustache - does he always need one when he's playing villains ? ) is also very good as his polar opposite, a man equally rootless but delighting in destruction. Mario Adorf is excellent as Schomberg getting the character's blend of malevolence and buffoonery exactly right. The only false notes are Doyle's OTT turn as Quinn which makes his early demise a blessing and director Vadim Glowna's ill-advised cameo as the boat captain.
Suzanna is superb as Julia a goodhearted girl who is nevertheless aware of her own sexual potency. She has several sex scenes revealing her breasts and, briefly, that ample bush once more. It just makes it seem more of a shame that her film career virtually ended here with just two more, widely-spaced, appearances to come.
8 Tale Of A Vampire (1992)
It was a full five years before Suzanna re-appeared in a full-length film, taking the lead female role in this mainly British horror film on the back of some sterling TV work in the intervening period. She plays a dual role as Anna, an assistant at a library specialising in the occult frequented by vampire Alex (Julian Sands) and, briefly, Virginia the nineteenth century lost love Alex is seeking.
The film is an Anglo-Japanese venture written and directed by a female, Shimako Sato. It was made while vampires were seriously unfashionable and Sato's unique angle is to mash-up the familiar Dracula tale with a completely separate literary legend (no spoilers here). It's partially successful - this is a better film than the godawful Bram Stoker's Dracula of the following year - but by no means essential viewing.
It's big on moody atmospherics - there's hardly a scene shot in daylight - but as short on action as you'd expect from a film based in a library. There's a bit of gore but it seems like a perfunctory concession to genre; the significant deaths take place offscreen. There's next to no sexual content either. The plot unwinds without any great surprises though there are one or two baffling moments like the street bum who inexplicably produces a shotgun or the restaurant conversation filmed from the POV of someone lying on the floor ( not at an angle to get an upskirt shot either ) .
On the plus side Suzanna has a good script to work from, playing to her strengths as an ingenue who reveals hidden depths of courage and passion. She's less successful in the historical role but that's not too important. Marion Diamond is also good as her fussy employer. Sato 's less adept with the male characters. Kenneth Cranham is effectively sinister as Anna's other stalker from the library but it's too obvious what his game is. That leaves us with Sands. This isn't the film that cemented his unofficial status as "World's worst actor" but it could have done, so poor is his delivery ; it's another feather in Suzanna's cap that she convinces in the romantic scenes playing opposite such a plank.
For Suzanna fans it's a must to see what we must assume to be her last substantial film role.
Otherwise its attractions are pretty limited.
9 The Island On Bird Street (1997)
House !! Finding this film means that this becomes the first 100% complete post since I started the blog. Alright Suzanna's only made nine films but it's still worth a cheer.
Suzanna's last film appearance to date is in this Danish adaptation of Uri Orlev's novel about a young Jewish boy surviving in the remnants of a cleared ghetto in Poland during World War Two. Director Soren Kragh-Jacobsen is a leading light of the Dogme 95 movement ( broadly speaking against the use of special effects in films ).
Alex ( 12- year old Jordan Kiziuk ) lives in the ghetto with his father ( Patrick Bergin ) and uncle Boruch ( Jack Warden ) but they know time is short and when the Nazi's round them up the latter sacrifices himself to allow Alex to escape into the rubble . The rest of the film follows Alex's resourceful adaptation to life in the shadows and insistence on staying put and waiting for the unlikely return of his father when members of the Polish resistance offer to help.
It's important to remember when viewing this film that it is based on a children's novel ; otherwise it would be very difficult to accept the ending. Similarly the horrors of the Holocaust are largely reduced to offscreen gunshots. On the other hand it's far too dark and scary for younger children who might have been attracted by a crass US trailer which suggested a cross between Schindler's List and Stuart Little ( Alex has a pet white rat Snow that he uses to sniff out hidden food caches ). It's actually closest in tone and content to the much more celebrated The Pianist which it predates by 5 years. Though sometimes a bit slow particularly during the family scenes at the beginning it's generally an absorbing, occasionally exciting story for adults and older children alike. The score by Zbigniew Preisner is another major plus in a film necessarily light on dialogue and won him an award at the 1997 Berlin Film Festival.
Kiziuk has many of the scenes to himself and delivers a superb physical performance. His acting isn't outstanding but more than competent for a newcomer. None of the adult parts are that large but Warden plays the obligatory elderly sage well enough and James Bolam impresses in a brief cameo as a Resistance-supporting doctor. If the dogme principles have been faithfully observed you'd have to credit the rat with a good performance too.
Suzanna's film swansong is brief and understated , barely 5 minutes worth towards the end of the film as the mother of a Polish girl Alex befriends but slots in nicely.
As Suzanna is only 52 we shouldn't assume that she won't one day take another film role particularly as her son has turned 18 but for now that's our lot.
10. My Feral Heart ( 2016 )
11. Winterstoke House ( 2016 )
12. The Gallery (2022)
