Kind of like imitation Ken Loach - producer Joseph Janni and star Carol White had previously made Poor Cow with Loach, which made money for Nat Cohen so he backed this. The director John Mackenzie had worked on Loach TV plays and the script is down beat - working class heroine who has a rough life, mum with MS who dies, a kid who is killed when knocked over by soccer hooligans, men let her down. There's an immigrant who love bombs her, a priest who seems a little keen on her, and a rocks star who uses her and exploits her trauma as a song.
The casting isn't quite right. Carol White seems disinterested - bored, not engaged. Roy Harper was a rock star (if not a famous one) so at least is believable as that. Castle doens't feel quite right as a the priest.
It's interesting - Howard Barker wrote it from a play based on John Lennon ripping off Eleanor Rigby. There are different views as to what makes life worth living - religion versus pop music.
The film doesn't get there but I love its ambition. White's character is very passive. (Like, why not have her there when the baby dies? Early 1970s films had a lot of dead baby's - Portnoy's Complaint, Cinderella Liberty).
