MartinHafer "Turn the Key Softly" is an interesting film and well worth your time. It's the story about three women who are released from prison on the same day. It follows each through their first day out and is a very melancholy story...one that will NOT be leaving you happy! There...you've been warned.The three ladies (one of which is a very young Joan Collins) all leave prison and the story clearly illustrates that you just can't go back to your old life. In one case, it's because family no longer want anything to do with one of the women. And, in another case, one returns to her crook boyfriend...something which clearly is NOT in her best interests. As for the final one, her story is a bit hard to categorize other than she likes nice things.Overall, this is a very good film for three reasons. It's best quality is that it's unique in so many ways...a major plus. It also has some terrific acting as well as brilliant cinematography--particularly late in the film during a chase sequence. Overall, not a lot to complain about apart from the depressing nature of some of the stories.

a.lampert What an entertaining film! Glamour, thrills, romance, sentimentality. This is a British black and white film noir, if that's the correct description to give it, but it give a clue in the night time robbery scene, the stark prison scenes at the beginning, the clandestine meetings the leading players have in alleyways, etc. The stars all act well, particularly Kathleen Harrison as an old lag who on her release in reunited with Johnny, her little dog, who plays as leading a part as the humans here. Joan Collins in an early glamour role is as striking then as she is now over sixty years later. The leading actress is Yvonne Mitchell and her lover is the villainous Terence Morgan, a part he was adept at playing in the 1950's. I didn't want it to end, and maybe, that's the secret of a great movie, leave 'em wanting more. Films today are often too long and that's why they are rarely great any more. There is a scene where a woman very briefly walks down the stairs past Yvonne Mitchell, and I could swear it was Prunella Scales (from Fawlty Towers) but it was so brief and she's not listed.

David Traversa I loved this movie! The three women destinies in a large metropolis (London -1950s) after they come out of jail with very different expectations seems to be quite an usual storyline in those years. London itself --as any large city-- looks completely different from the present London, although through this gloriously misty black and white photography it has a nostalgic Memory Lane feeling absolutely unique.One wishes to have been able to walk those streets and feel that particular atmosphere, completely gone by now.The film: It's so very well acted and edited that when it comes to the end, it seems to have only lasted for ten or fifteen minutes. The three women stories are quite banal but engaging because they are displayed alternately so we get to know these characters one by one and at the same time, since they run parallel lives and will keep in touch through different daily happenings.The beauty and sex appeal of a young Joan Collins was something to be seen. She was gorgeous! specially at the beginning, when still in jail and without any noticeable make up, she was stunning. As stunning as Joan, but on a different level was Yvonne Mitchell, a sedated beauty, classy and cool, very elegant and certainly as grand as any titled lady (many titled ladies will kill their grandmothers if they could look like her).The sequence on top of the building with the intervening police was quite nerve wreaking and superbly filmed and edited. The scenes with the old lady --Kathleen Harrison-- and her beloved dog, Johnny, were the sentimental segment that cemented the different episodes among these three women.There is a crucial scene where the title "Turn the key softly" makes sense because it was dependent on that, that one of the protagonists could escape a cruel and unjust outcome. Even if nowadays the strings pulled in this movie to keep one interested in the story telling are too obvious, the film doesn't fail in entertaining one from beginning to end.

malcolmgsw This was one of a number of films made at this time arising out of shared experiences of institutions.There were films about Borstal s,Prisons,schools,department stores and police station.In this film we follow the lives of 3 ex women prisoners on the day of their release.The main story is that of Yvonne Mitchell and Terrance Morgan,then there is Joan Collins and finally Kathleen Harrison.The first story is far and away the best and supplies the main climax to the film.Mitchell wants to go straight but is inveigled into a robbery by Morgan.She manages to escape and leave him to his fate.Collins is a good time girl who is enticed into her old ways,probably prostitution,by her old friends.She is going to marry a bus conductor would you believe.Her acting is absolutely awful,and her attempt to speak with a cockney accent is laughable.Can anyone believe a Joan Collins character happily married to a bus conductor.the third story concerns the reliable Kathleen Harrison and her dog Johnny.This is a real shaggy dog story and really the worst of the bunch and which leads to a very contrived finale. The most interesting part of this film is the location work and to be reminded of the way London was in the 50s.Incidentally Collins is shown outside the Leicester Square Theatre,now the Odeon West End.On Tuesday the vandals at Westminster agreed to its demolition so that yet another hotel could be built there.Shame on them.