I was glad I read the book before I watched the movie. The film was different than the book. In the novel, Allison McKenzie (the aspiring writer), Norman Page (mama's boy), Selena Cross (Allison's best friend who is sexually molested by her stepfather Lucas), Ted Carter (Selena's boyfriend), Rodney Harrington (Allison's crush), and Betty Anderson (the town tramp) attend Peyton Place Junior High School. In the film, they're in their senior year of Peyton Place High School. Michael Rossi, who wins Allison's mother, Constance Mckenzie's heart, comes to town to accept a job as principal at Peyton Place High School. Betty and Rodney get married in the film.

Peyton Place is the 1957 classic based on Grace Metalious' best seller about sex, sin, and secrets in a small New Hampshire town.Despite John Michael Hayes' somewhat watered down screenplay, the spirit of Metalious' steamy novel still pervades as we watch small town morality being challenged and championed at every turn. This glossy soap opera weaves multiple stories and characters to great effect. Lana Turner heads the all-star cast as Constance MacKenzie, the owner of a dress shop and mother of 18-year old Allison (Diane Varsi) a sensitive teen who dreams of being a writer and has a mad crush on Norman Page (Russ Tamblyn) who Allison has been throwing herself at without much success. Allison's best friend is Selena Cross (Hope Lange) who works in Constance's dress shop, even though she lives on the wrong side of the tracks with her drunken stepfather Lucas (Arthur Kennedy). Rodney Harrington (Barry Coe) constantly butts head with his father (Leon Ames) over his romance with the town tramp, Betty Anderson(Terry Moore). Lee Phillips plays Michael Rossi, a newcomer to Peyton Place who has been hired as the new high school principal, a job that all the students were sure would go to beloved English teacher Ellie Thornton (Mildred Dunnock), who finds himself attracted to Constance MacKenzie.Despite John Michael Hayes' somewhat watered down screenplay, the spirit of Metalious' steamy novel still pervades as we watch small town morality being challenged and championed at every turn. This glossy soap opera weaves multiple stories and characters to great effect. Lana Turner heads the all-star cast as Constance MacKenzie, the owner of a dress shop and mother of 18-year old Allison (Diane Varsi) a sensitive teen who dreams of being a writer and has a mad crush on Norman Page (Russ Tamblyn) who Allison has been throwing herself at without much success. Allison's best friend is Selena Cross (Hope Lange) who works in Constance's dress shop, even though she lives on the wrong side of the tracks with her drunken stepfather Lucas (Arthur Kennedy). Rodney Harrington (Barry Coe) constantly butts head with his father (Leon Ames) over his romance with the town tramp, Betty Anderson(Terry Moore). Lee Phillips plays Michael Rossi, a newcomer to Peyton Place who has been hired as the new high school principal, a job that all the students were sure would go to beloved English teacher Ellie Thornton (Mildred Dunnock), who finds himself attracted to Constance MacKenzie.There are some dated elements here, but this film pretty much invented the genre known as soap opera and a few years later, in addition to a sequel, would become the first prime time television soap opera, which was actually broadcast two days a week.Mark Robson's sensitive direction is a big plus and the cast is first rate. Lana Turner received her one and only Oscar nomination for Outstanding Lead Actress for her work here. Varsi, Lange, Kennedy, and Tamblyn also received supporting nominations. If you're a sucker for good old fashioned melodrama, have your fill here. They don't make 'em like this anymore.

Based on a controversial (at the time, at least) novel, PEYTON PLACE is a story about the lives and secrets of people who live in a small New England town. Also having seen a few melodramas recently, including both versions of IMITATION OF LIFE, I've noticed what does and doesn't work about these films, at least for me. Whereas IMITATION OF LIFE goes for a more sappy dramatic angle, PEYTON PLACE is more tawdry and salacious (by 50's standards), and therefore a little more interesting. The characters in this film were also better written and the performances were more restrained, so that the drama was a little more believable. The only major issues with the film are that it begins to lose steam about two hours in and concludes in a rather stuffy, dramatically inert fashion. However, it does pretty much everything else quite well. The performances were all excellent and the various plot threads were all deftly handled and given due attention, as well as being interconnected enough to drive the story without seeming episodic. And even though the score was a little overblown at times, it fit the material well. The cinematography was also great to look at, and there were some beautiful on-location shots. Overall, while it was a little overstuffed and a little too long, PEYTON PLACE is a good example of how to make melodrama compelling without resorting to least common denominator emotions.

OK for starters the movie entertains me lots, but i still think that, between all the silly dialog of this characters and their morality problems resides just a silly movie full of clichés and a beautiful cinematography.The movie, based on a famous bestseller from the 50s, is full of rape, misogyny, murder, abortion ... a lot of topics for a trashy exploitation movie. This is not exploitation, even if all the topics are included here. The thing is that are so, but really so outdated, that you cant avoid the jiggle.Still, the performances are very good, the Cinemascope photography is gorgeous, and, at the end, the direction takes for more thank two hours of material like this. So, it's trashy but catchy.A 7.