I wanted to like it more than I actually did... But much of the humor totally escaped me and I walked out only mildly impressed.

Good films always raise compelling questions, whether the format is fiction or documentary fact.

It’s sentimental, ridiculously long and only occasionally funny

There are moments in this movie where the great movie it could've been peek out... They're fleeting, here, but they're worth savoring, and they happen often enough to make it worth your while.

Melina Mercouri plays the unhappily married wife of a cheating Englishman who, while cooped up in an overbooked hotel in a Spanish village with her husband, their child and the husband's mistress, spies someone hiding on a rooftop--the man all the police are searching for, one who has committed double murder, a crime of passion. Adaptation of Marguerite Duras' novel "Dix heures et demie du soir en été" ("Ten-Thirty on a Summer Night"), by Duras and director-producer Jules Dassin, is full of tangled emotions, conflicted desires, crazy behavior (with Mercouri as the jilted wife, how could you not have crazy behavior?). Dassin has movie-making fever, and he pulls a few visual surprises (including a startling point-of-view shot as Melina walks through the crowded hotel at night). Still, these people and their romantic predicament fail to be very interesting. Far more successful is Mercouri's maternal feelings for the murderer--not a major part of the plot, but the moment in the movie when the emotions on-screen really take hold. The haunting finale is memorable as well. **1/2 from ****

A sexually frustrated Maria (Mercouri) is traveling through Spain with her husband and a younger woman Claire. Maria's husband is carrying on with Claire and Maria an alcoholic is sexual with every man who chances her way including a murderer in the town they are stuck in.The murderer had committed a crime of passion with which perhaps Maria (Mercouri) identifies. She helps the murderer get out of town and falls in love with him in the process although they are together for perhaps a half hour and exchange three words...This film is arty erotic the final flamenco dance looks like a surrogate drugged out orgasm involving all the actors and extras.60s middle age sexual sequence....lots of these made= Whose Afraid of Virginia Wolf... Roman Spring of Mrs. Stone.... etc etc... this one was briefer with less story to it.I only watched it to see Mercouri (did any actress have a deeper voice?)Trust me this thing is boring.

There was only one reason why I watched "10:30 PM Summer"--because it was directed by Jules Dassin. Dassin might just be among the most underrated directors of all time--with some amazing classics and hidden gems among his many films. Some of them are pretty famous (such as "Rafifi") but many others are just great films that somehow slipped through the cracks (such as "Thieves Highway" and "Brute Force"). Is "10:30 PM Summer" one of these hidden gems? It certainly is not considered a classic.I noticed on IMDb that the reviews for this film were all over the place and very inconsistent. One declared that the Melina Mercouri was 'the worst actress ever' while another thought she was 'magnificent' and one of the only good things about the film! And, scores ranged from 3 stars to 10! This film boasts a strange international cast with a Brit (Peter Finch), German (Romy Schneider) and Greek (Melina Mercouri) in the leads. The story is set Spain! It's a tale about a bizarre three-some--with a husband and wife and the husband's lover all on some sort of road trip. During the course of the trip, they wander into a town where a double murder just occurred--as a jealous husband shot his wife and her lover. This causes Mercouri's character to further lament her life and she spends most of the film drinking and talking and brooding. This is THE problem with the film. It is VERY talky and has very little in the way of plot. As a result, it felt very dull to me...very dull indeed. A rather lifeless and talky mess--a rare case where Dassin had a misfire.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not unsympathetic against Mercouri, who, in private life, may be or may have been a most charming person. What I want to say is: If that lady isn't hamming it up and acting beyond all tops, then there is no such acting! I'm afraid that lady must have been a hysteric when not drunk in real life, which comes across pretty obvious here. Nice colours throughout the film. Nothing wrong with the framework, in other words. But what is it framing? Maybe just everything was so much more innocent before. Happier times come to life in which we were still learning and everything was still becoming better for the poor and for me this film is therefore worth so much more. Otherwise, it's a bore, if it weren't for the beautiful pictures.