Say Hello to Yesterday is a 1971 British romantic comedy-drama film directed by Alvin Rakoff and starring Jean Simmons and Leonard Whiting.

On a winter morning in an affluent suburb, the Woman – having just said goodbye to her stockbroker husband and their two young children – is going to London, shopping.

According to Rakoff, Say Hello to Yesterday was "a 1970 Brief Encounter a picture designed purely for entertainment, with no morals or messages unless the public like to find them.

[6] The Monthly Film Bulletin wrote: "Optimistically described as a 'Brief Encounter of the Seventies', this arch and cold-blooded romance is a long way from anything other than its own modish contemporaries, and Alvin Rakoff surrenders with complete abandon to the principle that visual effects take precedence over the story being told: no sooner have the couple finished an obligatory stint on the swings and slides at the children's playground than they are whisked into the Planetarium or to the top of the Post Office Tower.

And when the affair is over, the boy's last defiant gesture takes the form of releasing a bunch of balloons over Victoria Station (which presumably looks more photogenic than Waterloo, the actual departure point for trains to Cobham).

Jean Simmons performs throughout with a detached dignity – an indispensable quality for clambering through climbing frames – but Leonard Whiting, accustomed to playing more orthodox young lovers, is no match for the part of the boy, a larger than life character at the best of times and a hazily defined one at worst.

"[7] Variety called it "a silly and contrived meant-to-be modish version of Brief Encounter" in which the Whiting's character "is just too banal to be believable, and his antics, which are meant to be cute, are simply adolescent and embarrassing.