Dear God this was/is dreadful! It's difficult to find a single positive thing to say about it, Okay, Jane Asher is lovely to look at, I agree with the chap called Ionizing, it needs more than that. John M.Brown behaves less like a fifteen year old youth and more like a simpering twelve year old girl. The 'acting' reminded me of a bunch of school children having been told to improvise the dialogue, it was that stilted. Take a look at the scene where the youth is being interviewed for the job by the manager of the baths. The chap looked like seedy escapee from the local lock up, and acted as though he had found himself in the office by accident. The schoolteacher character, he'd have been arrested for his behaviour in no time. The baths themselves appeared to be run as a second class brothel for all the local weirdos. I was persuaded to purchase this mess because of glowing write-ups from people who I assume had a share in the profits. I'd like my money back please! Avoid this like the plague!

If you can imagine that this is your brief to make a film that must contain all of 1-4. 1)A sleazy swimming baths and steaming wash rooms. 2)A young woman swimming bath attendant and a young boy swimming bath attendant who are the principal characters. 3)Various other characters who visit the swimming baths. 4)Obsessional love. So from the list above an exceptional film must be made. It must hold your attention throughout. It must be fresh; never sluggish. It must have superb camera work. The principal characters must be void of cliché dialogue - and this is the hard part - use ABSOLUTE naturalistic dialogue - or improvised? If you think you can do it better than the above film then please do so. If not then watch 'Deep End'. Not only did I enjoy this film immensely but fell deeply in love (if you'll pardon the pun) with Jane Asher.

For many years a somewhat obscure and unseen semi-avant garde melodrama,DEEP END has had a recent revival in digitally restored fashion in cinema,DVD and television,and has an undercurrent of strangeness running through it's entire oeuvre.Set in post-swinging 60's London,but an American/West German co-production directed by Polish-born Jerzy Skolimowski mostly filmed in Germany,with an eclectic cast and musical score,a dubious story and related characters.This overall oddness does not necessarily equate to greatness,but DEEP END still nevertheless manages to hold the attention throughout.A decidedly gauche,awkward 15 year old youth,Mike (John Moulder-Brown) starts his first job at a grimy,dilapidated London municipal bathhouse,and falls in love with a beautiful but uninhibited female co-worker,Susan (Jane Asher),a few years older than him.Susan is apparently engaged but uses and exploits other males for her own pleasure,including the hapless Mike himself.The attraction gradually seems to become more mutual,if dangerous.Coming at the end of the optimistic,happy-go-lucky 60's and populated with rather unlikable characters,DEEP END is packed with so much symbolism as to be in peril from drowning in it.The setting of the seedy,crumbling bathhouse is an obvious metaphor for being literally thrown into the deep rather than shallow end of life,with the related problems,frustrations and behaviour on show signifying this.For a while,DEEP END comes across as a familiar but wispily charming essay on the pains of growing up,with an amusing cameo from Diana Dors (who became a better actress as she got into early middle-age),holding Mike to her bosom while mumbling platitudes about football,though it's not long before it all becomes progressively darker,with dubious behaviour from a male swimming instructor (who Susan has a dalliance with) towards young female students,and an increasingly unhealthy relationship between Mike,so wet behind the ears as to be soaking,and the voluptuous Susan.Moulder-Brown is fine as the hopelessly naive adolescent,though as with many teens his character's behaviour and traits often becomes very irritating,while Ms Asher is convincing as his and other males object of desire,outrageously sexy and knowing it,teasing and cajoling as many males as she can muster,mostly for her own entertainment and amusement in the skimpiest clothing imaginable.With all this symbolism (such as Mike stealing a cardboard life size poster of Susan from London's underground) and semi-Freudian obsession,DEEP END has little in the way of plot,and much of the cast are not British but mainland European (mainly German).This sometimes gets in the way of authenticity for the more pessimistic mood of late 60's/early 70's London (not surprising as much of the film was apparently filmed in Munich),and Skolimowski often seems not to have an ear for the English language,with some scenes allowed to ramble with somewhat stilted dubbed and non-dubbed dialogue.There is much use of hand-held camera and other scenes which have an improvised feel,which is not necessarily a bad thing as said moments have a more spontaneous,humorous and natural feel to them.Such locations as the bathhouse and Soho (which features a funny cameo from Burt Kwouk) add to a sense of decline and seediness while observing the dubious behaviour of the main and secondary characters involved,which inevitably leads to the climax in the swimming pool,with the symbolism at it's height as it being empty and drained of water,but there is a twist in store.....With it's dreary,seedy setting and unsympathetic characters,DEEP END could have been utterly disposable,yet it's very style deem it oddly compulsive and curiously watchable,with it's best moments reserved for it's finale with haunting and extraordinary imagery that linger in the mind long afterwards,confirming it's reputation of being a bizarre,rediscovered cult classic.RATING:7 out of 10.

Cute working class fifteen-year-old John Moulder-Brown (as Mike) gets a job an attendant in a London bathhouse and falls "head-over-heels" in love with his co-worker, sexy red-haired Jane Asher (as Sue). He meets "ladies of a certain age," like overweight Diana Dors, "who favours young boys" - but, Mr. Moulder-Brown can't stop fantasizing about the delectable Ms. Asher; she was the inspiration for many of The Beatles' love songs, "And I Love Her"..."Deep End" is an imaginatively shot, by Jerzy Skolimowski with Charly Steinberger, story involving obsessive teenage love, with Moulder-Brown very effectively essaying the "mature for his age" protagonist. You also get a good look at Ms. Asher as an actress, which she was before achieving world-wide fame as a Paul McCartney's first significant relationship. The film's ending is somewhat disappointing; it certainly could have been more... electric.****** Deep End (3/18/71) Jerzy Skolimowski ~ John Moulder-Brown, Jane Asher, Diana Dors, Karl Michael Vogler