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The National Health or Nurse Norton's Affair Reviews

  • 1973
  • 1 hr 35 mins
  • Comedy
  • PG
  • Watchlist
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Satire on British welfare medicine and TV medical dramas. Lynn Redgrave, Donald Sinden. Sister McFee/Sister Mary: Eleanor Bron. Loach: Colin Blakely. Barnet/Neil: Jim Dale. Nurse Powell/Cleo: Sheila Scott-Wilkinson. Leyland/ Monk: Neville Aurelius. Rees: Mervyn Johns. Ash: Clive Swift. Dr. Bird: Gillian Barge. Peter Nichols script from his play.

The British National Health System is skewered in this comedy set in a rundown London hospital. The hospital is filled with wacky staff members and patients, and the film strives to get all it can from their humorous escapades. The movie also includes a satire-within-a-satire, with "Nurse Norton's Affair" providing a send-up of TV hospital soap operas and giving some cast members the chance to play two roles. It tries for both comedy and social commentary but can't quite pull it off, although the competent cast does its best with the material.