I think this is my first experience with the "angry young man" genre of the British New Wave. And I can only hope that it's not the "pinnacle." as I have heard.
This was very much a dialogue driven film with very passionate and angry rants delivered beautifully by Richard Burton. This serves the purpose to show that he is one of the biggest jerks in movie history. Later, we find more and more about his troubled past and his relationship with his parents, which only proves that he is a complicated jerk.
I'm not sure who we were supposed to identify with in this one. When it's all said and done, you only get the deep feeling that you have arrived at the exact place that you have started.