Shown: 6 October 2021
Exminster Film Club Rating: 80%
- Date of release: 2020
- Running time: 1h 47m
- Director: Philippa Lowthorpe
- Writers: Rebecca Frayn and Gaby Chiappe
- Country: UK and France
- Language: English
- Links: IMDB Rotten Tomatoes Metacritic BBFC Official Film Website
Misbehaviour Plot Synopsis
In 1970, the Miss World competition took place in London, hosted by US comedy legend, Bob Hope. At the time, Miss World was the most-watched TV show on the planet with over 100 million viewers. Claiming that beauty competitions demeaned women, the newly formed Women’s Liberation Movement achieved overnight fame by invading the stage and disrupting the live broadcast of the competition. Not only that, when the show resumed, the result caused uproar: the winner was not the Swedish favourite but Miss Grenada, the first black woman to be crowned Miss World. In a matter of hours, a global audience had witnessed the patriarchy driven from the stage and the Western ideal of beauty turned on its head.
Film Reviews
If there is a tonal uncertainty in this comedy, then that’s because there was a tonal uncertainty in the real-life events, and the movie nicely conveys how they were at one and the same time deadly serious and Pythonically silly.
Peter Bradshaw, The Guardian
Well written, -acted, -cast and -produced, this wholly entertaining yet stingingly relevant story of the 1970 Miss World finals should have been a smash hit when it opened in UK theatres on March 13, but events overtook its release.
Fionnuala Halligan, Screen Daily