Shirley Valentine (film) seem recycled directly from greeting cards . . . If there is a shred of plausibility in the film, it comes from Bernard Hill's performance as Shirley Valentine's husband. He isn't a bad bloke, just a tired and indifferent one, and when he follows his wife to Greece at the end of the film there are a few moments so truthful that they show up the artifice of the rest." Shirley Valentine (film) Shirley Valentine is an award-winning 1989 British romantic comedy-drama film directed by Lewis Gilbert. The screenplay by Willy Russell is based on his 1986 one-character play of
Lewis Gilbert Lewis Gilbert Lewis Gilbert (6 March 1920 – 23 February 2018) was a British film director, producer and screenwriter, who directed more than 40 films during six decades; among them such varied titles as "Reach for the Sky" (1956), "Sink the Bismarck!" (1960), "Alfie" (1966), "Educating Rita" (1983) and "Shirley Valentine" (1989), as well as three James Bond films: "You Only Live Twice" (1967), "The Spy Who Loved Me" (1977) and "Moonraker" (1979). Lewis Gilbert was born in Hackney, London, to a second-generation family of music hall performers, and spent his early years travelling with his parents, Ada (Griver), who