Very frank in its time, with its understated themes of homosexuality and racism, this story of student unrest at university - and of a professor's wife in love with a student - gave first screen chances to Ian McShane, Samantha Eggar, John Hurt and John Standing. Its salty dialogue and bedroom scenes caused quite a stir at the time but, such has been the `progress' of film censorship in recent years, that it would probably all get by today without so much as a 12A certificate. Despite getting bogged down occasionally in its own verbosity, the story by Nicholas Phipps and Mordecai Richler still manages to generate moments of high excitement - none more so than a climatic climb up the sheer side of a crumbling steeple - a few minutes that are guaranteed to have you on the edge of your chair.

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