Throughout September I will be raiding my collection of favourite movies to review one a day, with a focus on overlooked and underappreciated films.
Where to find it: Rent on Amazon
Length: 90 minutes
Synopsis: Odd, unpleasant allegory on the English Civil War
Recommendation rating: 3/5
What I like about it: writing is genius, acting brilliant, editing great
What I don’t like about it: it’s really not much fun and very weird
Review:
An eccentric, grim puzzle about three filthy, desperate deserters from the English Civil War who are led on a dark journey to find treasure in the titular field. They eat hallucinogenic mushrooms and are pressed into service for a guy they pulled out of the ground. Kinda genius, especially Amy Jump’s screenplay with period language and observations on class and religion. If you do take it on, expect lots of pretension – it’s in black & white and makes extensive use of tableau vivant – and prepare to be confused.
The characters represent paganism (Jacob), “slave mentality” Christianity (Friend), the clergy and intelligentsia (Whitehead), the middle class (Cutler) and the ice-chewing sociopaths out for a quick buck (O’Neill) and they’re haunted by visions of an ‘ill planet’ as they dig ever deeper at the behest of their new masters. It’s a great allegory but if you’ve no stomach for weirdness, realism and history there won’t be much here to enjoy.
Content notes (may contain spoilers): (pretty much) strobe lighting, violence, defecation, genitals