Three Into Two Won’t Go (Blu-ray Review)
- Review Date: Apr 17, 2026
- Format: Blu-ray Disc
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Director
Peter HallRelease Date(s)
1969 (March 25, 2026)Studio(s)
Julian Blaustein Productions/Universal Pictures (Imprint Films/Via Vision Entertainment)- Film/Program Grade: B+
- Video Grade: A-
- Audio Grade: B+
- Extras Grade: B
Review
[Editor’s Note: This is a Region-Free Australian Blu-ray import.]
Domestic dramas about marriages in distress or divorce were rare in films prior to the 1960s. Before then, divorce and marital strife were played for laughs in screwball comedies with the parties winding up happy and together. Much of the country regarded divorce as a no-no. Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? opened the door to more realistic treatments of unhappy marriages. In Three Into Two Won’t Go, a couple’s unhappiness is brought to a head by a young, attractive woman.
Unhappily married assistant sales director Steve Howard (Rod Steiger, In the Heat of the Night) picks up hitchhiker Ella (Judy Geeson, To Sir, With Love), a free spirit who isn’t shy about flaunting her sensuality. They stop at a hotel, have dinner, and spend the night together. Ella has drifted from one job to another and keeps a little black book documenting her numerous lovers and ranking them on their sexual performance. Steve gets her a job as chambermaid/waitress at the hotel and continues to see her there. Ella fulfills his physical and emotional needs.
Steve and his wife, Frances (Claire Bloom, The Haunting), have recently moved into a new house, hoping the fresh environment will help to revitalize their marriage. He resents the monetary burden the mortgage has placed on him but nonetheless remains civil with Frances. A major topic of contention between them is that she wants a child but he’s reluctant. They have discussed adoption but never made a decision. When Steve goes away on business, Ella turns up at the house and reveals she’s pregnant, though she doesn’t implicate Steve. She and Frances strike up an unlikely friendship, Ella asks to stay the night, and Frances agrees. It soon becomes apparent that Ella isn’t eager to leave.
Directed by Peter Hall and based on a novel by Andrea Newman, Three Into Two Won’t Go is dialogue-driven and borders on staginess with its limited number of locations. The plot sounds a bit melodramatic. What makes the film rise above soap opera is the intense, honest performances. Steiger, in particular, turns in a portrayal of controlled power and ably communicates through facial expression and body language his state of anxiety as Ella seems to have taken residence in his home. In later films, Steiger tended to be over the top and shout a lot, but here he conveys pent-up anguish.
Bloom conveys quiet desperation as her Frances tries to preserve her marriage to Steve yet fears he’s slipping further away, his trips on the road metaphorically underscoring their emotional distance. Periodically, we see Frances painting walls white, perhaps another indication she wants the house to represent a new beginning for them. Bloom was married to Steiger at the time and their own marriage was deteriorating. Whether her personal marital discord had an effect on her performance is hard to say, but she’s extremely sympathetic and authentic in her acting choices.
Geeson, only 19 when she made Three Into Two Won’t Go, captures Ella’s bohemian, devil-may-care spirit and her talent for manipulation. Ella can be both blatantly sexual with Steve, presenting herself stark naked as the prize she knows he wants, and disarmingly sympathetic, playing on Frances’ loneliness to befriend her. She has used her body and mind in a promiscuous pursuit of pleasure and prides herself on knowing how to read people. Working with seasoned professionals Steiger and Bloom, Geeson more than holds her own.
Supporting performers are also excellent and include Peggy Ashcroft (Secret Ceremony) as Frances’ mother Belle and Paul Rogers (Stolen Hours) as hotel owner Jack Roberts.
Three Into Two Won’t Go was shot by director of photography Walter Lassally on 35mm film in the Technicolor process and presented in the widescreen aspect ratio of 1.85:1. The Blu-ray from Imprint Films contains an aspect ratio of 1.66:1. Sourced from a 2K master, the film grain quality of the original is preserved. Detail is good, with stubble on Steiger’s face, decor in the hotel dining room, views outside the Howard’s picture window, and clothing patterns well delineated. There’s an occasional flat look to certain scenes, but that’s more from lighting than picture quality. Everything is relatively clean aside from occasional white speckling.
The soundtrack is English 2.0 mono LPCM. English SDH subtitles are available. Dialogue is clear and distinct in this dialogue-heavy film and balanced well with ambient background noise in the restaurant and office scenes. Overall, the mono soundtrack lacks the impact of multi-channel sound and often appears a bit muddy. The humming of the car’s engine is heard in the opening scene as Steve drives hitchhiker Ella. In the last third of the film, characters raise their voices, marking a dramatic difference from their calm, soft speech earlier on. Francis Lai’s title theme is catchy, but is sometimes reprised inappropriately, at odds with a scene’s dramatic purpose.
Bonus materials on the Region-Free Blu-ray release from Imprint Films include the following:
- Audio Commentary by Matthew Asprey Gear
- A Vivid Memory: Actress Lynn Farleigh Recalls Three Into Two Won’t Go (6:03)
- Alternate TV Version (99:54)
- Theatrical Trailer (2:20)
Commentary – Cinema author and critic Matthew Asprey Gear refers to Three Into Two Won’t Go as a “bleak marital drama.” The driving scenes were shot in Surrey, outside London. The film is an example of late 1960s Hollywood-funded British cinema. Rod Steiger assumes an Irish accent for his role of Steve Howard. Steiger is referred to as a “king actor,” meaning that he was made for big roles. In this role, he reins in his performance. The film is based on a controversial 1967 novel by Andrea Newman. Steven’s interior monologues from the book don’t carry over into the film, but it does follow the novel’s theme of sexual liberation. Hitchhiking movies aren’t as prevalent in Britain as they’re in the U.S. Commentator Gear speaks about the score by Francis Lai, and one theme associated with the character of Ella. Many young actors got their start on British TV. For a time, it was less expensive to make films in Britain than in Hollywood. Universal made a series of pictures there but the venture didn’t turn out to be profitable and the studio wound up re-cutting many of them, including Three Into Two Won’t Go, for American television. The filmmakers faced challenges working in an actual house because the limited space made the placement of cameras and lighting equipment difficult. The film plays out like “a piece of theater” because so much of the story takes place in a single location. Ella is the catalyst of Steven and Frances’ break-up. The couple’s problems had been festering long before Ella entered their lives. Brief career overviews are provided for Rod Steiger, Claire Bloom, and Judy Geeson. Steiger and Bloom, married in real life, divorced in 1969.
A Vivid Memory – Lynn Farleigh, who played the role of Steven’s secretary Janet, offers her reminiscences of making Three Into Two Won’t Go. She says the role was a firm offer from director Peter Hall. She had just starred on Broadway for Hall in Harold Pinter’s The Homecoming. Her first meeting with Rod Steiger didn’t go well. When he started reciting dialogue from the script and she didn’t respond, he angrily complained that she didn’t know her lines. It was explained that she hadn’t yet seen the script. She was upset that her professionalism had been questioned. During production, she recalls that Steiger was a wonderful raconteur and they worked well together.
Alternate TV version – To fill space left by removal of R-rated nudity and intimate scenes, approximately twenty minutes of new footage was shot and edited in. The new footage explains Ella’s delinquent proclivities and adds several characters: a probation officer looking for her, and her abusive father, withdrawn mother, and rock star wannabe boyfriend. The TV cut is longer by 7 minutes and completely adulterates the original script by Edna O’Brien. Director Peter Hall demanded that his name be removed from the TV version, and judging by his name’s absence in the credit sequence of this version, he got his way.
A commentary by historians Troy Howarth and Nathaniel Thompson and four trailers from the 2023 Kino-Lorber Blu-ray release are not included.
Three Into Two Won’t Go is a realistic look at the strains put on both partners in a troubled marriage. Steve seeks in Ella what he lacks at home, and Frances looks to Ella as a companion who just might be the means of getting her marriage back on track. Ella, sometimes knowing and in charge, at other times seems out of her depth. The early part of the film is slow but the pace picks up as the characters’ psychological machinations come into focus. Often overly melodramatic, the staginess of scenes fails to provide adequate visual variety. This is an adult story, the kind of drama that was once typical of Hollywood releases but has given way these days to spectacle, franchises, and sequels.
- Dennis Seuling