A Field in England

The first 20 minutes really did their best to make me hate it, essentially feeling like three LARPers in someone's garden with a smoke machine, combined with annoying editing/dialogue... *shiver* It started to draw me back in with the addition of Michael Smiley who generally makes everything better. All in all I enjoyed the trippy scenes, the sense of dread / inevitability and the almost tangible nature / folky magic use. Still not very satisfying as a whole.

People seem to think Wheatley performed some sort of conjuring trick here, magically producing a good movie out of a few lines of story and $300000. In part, they're right, he did conjure something, he apparently got a bunch of scrupulous critics to appreciate this rancid pile of shit. As for his second magic trick, no one has been able to explain how he made that $300000 disappear, but I can tell you it definitely didn't go into this movie.

After an underwhelming 'talky' start it becomes a creepy and comic story with some great visuals and an authentic period feel.

The intentions may have been admirable but the execution did not appeal to this viewer.

Wheatley uses genres (historical film, war drama) almost as an artistic excuse to develop a crazy-ass and psychedelic take on humanity most primal flaws (greed, an extreme belief in rituals, Christianity as measure of pain and cure), shot in a beautiful black and white with the England countryside serving as a scenario for the director's slowmos, dreamy clips, wacky jokes and ultraviolent sequences. Not his most compelling -- sometimes its absorbing imagery looks showy --, but still solid.

Seen a few of Wheatley's films now; I like them, but don't entirely "get" them - I always feel like I'm missing some message or theme. That said, this is another strong effort. It looks good, and I got vibes of Peter Watkins' Culloden (which traumatised me as a child) blended with folk horror and curious monochrome psychedelia. It's a bit disjointed until Smiley turns up, but from there it is rather compelling. Shearsmith was great value for money here. Won't be for everyone, but worth a look.

I like the idea of a claustrophobic movie about a field, but that's about it.

This gets by quite a bit on "Haven't seen that before!" fuel. The B&W photography is fine, the actors are fascinatingly comfortable in such bizarre roles, and the music in particular is memorable. There are occasional psychedelic montages that go off the deep end a little; some of them work but others feel less visceral and less organic. They tend to look more like someone playing around with all the things editing software can do rather than something with purpose. Weird flick for weird people.

Some interesting scenes here and there but this experimental and punishingly incoherent nonsense is just that - nonsense. Maybe it was the point, but whatever. I have yet to like a Wheatley film.

Were the pounding drums, black and white picture, and Japan-esque poster supposed to bring to mind Kurosawa? I'm guessing so. Kudos to the ambition, but he's got a hell of a long way to go.

As ramblingly incoherent and self-indulgent as it is powerfully arresting and compelling. The unconvincing opening 10 minutes give way to an oddly gripping and disorientating experience. Wheatley is a fascinating filmmaker and the positives here far outweigh the negatives.

Just like all those other movies based on drug-induced tomfoolery, they say you have to actually have BEEN to a field in England to truly understand and appreciate this film. As I have not, I was left confused and craving mushroom stew.

Low-budget filmmaking done right. This film shows some sort of political microcosm, revealing the folk of these times as crude, depraved, and shit-stained as they likely were. These characters are crass in their appearance and dialogue, but due to the immersive writing and acting, they are not uninviting. There are moments of cinematic invention, both weird and wonderful, and the editing towards the end becomes very hallucinogenic.The music is also brilliantly varied and in tune with the visuals

Boring as hell.

Equally intriguing and incoherent. It plays like the ravings of a hallucinating lunatic on psychedelic drugs. While it lacks definitive reason, it's a wild experience all the same being alternately hilarious and nauseating.

In typical Wheatley fashion, "A Field in England" is equal parts strange, haunting and beautiful. Begins with a very ponderous first act, but once the weirdness kicked in I couldn't look away, especially during the slow-mo rope scene. Absolutely stunning B&W cinematography. Smiley and Shearsmith are fantastic.

Muddled and aimless, though nevertheless unique and containing several sequences worth discussing. Ultimately didn't do much for me, however, and I tend to gravitate towards the avant garde--so long as its experimental nature makes sense within the context of the narrative. In this case (magic... mushrooms), I felt it was egregious in calling attention to itself. Might be worth a rewatch. Probably won't. Also not nearly as "psychedelic" as people espouse outside of one key moment.

Extremily boring.

A marked improvement over the last Wheatly film I saw, the frustratingly mediocre Kill List. The folk horror elements here feel organic rather than tacked on, the cinematography is fantastic, and the characters enunciate rather than mumble dramatically. And one shot may be the most genuinely creepy thing I've seen in years. Honestly though, and this is totally a personal thing, it could have benefited from less plot and a lot more shroomery.

How the hell do you make a movie like this and not provide subtitles? When your movie is a mumbly theater piece of a bunch of dudes decked out like Hopkins, Witchfinder General, understanding what's being said is kinda important...

The material of this film might work if it was cut up into selected 5-30 second pieces and shown in a museum of modern art. Extremely boring.

An enigmatic narrative coupled with haunting, poetic cinematography makes this an intriguing watch.

An "Aguirre, The Wrath of God" for the 21st century, in every sense of the title

I saw this at the Slash Film Festival and therefore was slightly surprised to find a relatively slow, artsy movie with almost no brutality or gore in it. Besides my misdirected expectations I found the movie to be poetic, quite confusing at times, but appealing and ambitious. Yet, if you're looking for slasher fun, I'd look some more...

Very ambitious and original, but poor execution.

I really wanted to like this having enjoyed Wheatley's Kill List and Sightseers a great deal. But I felt that this was like an experiment which didn't pay off. There are some great moments though and I can easily image this becoming a cult movie in the future. I just hope you'll like it more than I did.

The formalism and rather dry script make this pretty challenging to get through, although there are some occasional moments of beauty - the kaleidoscopic scene in particular, but also plenty of natural shots of the vast billowing yet claustrophobic expanse of the field.

I just watched it and I'm confused,I don't know what to say. I mean this in a very good way. Hm.........creepy......Hm......poetic.......Hm........haunting.....Hm.... sometimes boring......and... dream like.......and..I think....I.... really liked it.....Hm....but I'm not shure.....or....Hm......

I won't dare claim that I even remotely understood what was going on in this film. So speaking to that of which I can I'll come out and say Ben Wheatley is a phenomenal director. The vibe and artistry asserted in this movie is ultimately captivating enough to override the (at least to me) incoherent plot, and very much on par with the previous Wheatley films that I've seen. On top of that the performances from Shearsmith, Smiley, and the rest match Wheatley's directorial vision perfectly.

This is my second Wheatley movie and I feel like my interests just don't really match with his style of directing. A Field In England looks really good and it has some eerie, trippy scenes. It also manages to rouse up a few laughs here and there, but overall I just wasn't there. It drags on. Apart from the visuals there's not much here for me to keep my interest up with. Maybe I just need to admit my defeat and declare that I'm too much of an idiot for a Wheatley movie because what the hell.

Had some interesting and creepy parts, but overall didn't really work for me.

As good as his previous work is, this is where Wheatley firmly established himself as one of the top directors working in the UK right now. One of the strangest films I've seen in some time, it does an amazing job of drawing you in before freaking the fuck out at you. By the end it's creepy and insane where other directors would make the same material seem utterly stupid and boring. Shearsmith is incredible.

"The coward is here."

Intensely psychedelic and insistently confusing. Once I started piecing together the abstract plot it became a little easier to gel with, but the mood the whole piece strikes would indicate it's something to be felt first then thought about in your nightmares.

Cinematography and sound are excellent. Dialogue is a weird mix of period and modern that sometimes works and sometimes doesn't. Editing can be a bit shaky and occassionally loses the sense of spatial geometry of the scene. Overall, I liked it more than I care about it's flaws.

77.000

I just don't see any of the positives that others highlight. The characters aren't interesting, there's hardly any story to speak of, I didn't at all feel the atmosphere that others seem to love, the cinematography is stale by the 15-minute mark since "a field in England" is quite literally all we see for the entire film, and the slow-motion and avant-garde editing felt less like purposeful artistic choices and more like tactics to pad out the short runtime to feature-length.

you had me at the foley.

I'm not entirely sure what this all amounts to, and not everything in it works, but Wheatley has definitely crafted a unique and eccentric piece of cinema. The photography is quite attractive, whether we're following what seems like a historical war film penned by Samuel Beckett or especially during the psychedelic freakouts near the end, and it has a shambling, darkly comedic charm to it even in its less compelling moments.

I felt like this was an ambitious failure, with the narrative too frustratingly fractured, although perhaps we are POV from some extremely unreliable narrators. That said, there is lots to enjoy here: a very English eccentricity, a good cast with interesting faces and some wildly psychedelic and often beautiful imagery.

a load of nonsense really but I do like the concept of tripping on shrooms in a field during the Civil War.One must admit, that is a genre which is sorely under populated.

Interesting.

İlk yarım saati biraz sallantıda gittikten sonra, yavaş yavaş toparlanıyor ve benzerine rastlamanın oldukça güç olduğu bir son yarım saat ile bitiyor. Öyle çok derin, yoğun bir metin değil belki, ama iyi bir film izlemenin verdiği keyfi veriyor sonunda.

Still a genre mashup, violent, a bit weird and very ambitious, but more composed and focused than the mess that was Kill List. Hopefully, Jump and Wheatley will build on this and continue maturing.

During the English Civil War, a group of men leave the scene of a battle only to come under the thrall of an alchemist, the nemesis of one of them, who orders them to find the treasure hidden in a field. Shrooms play their part in the goings-on. Ben Wheatley's direction is often striking, with the B&W cinematography, the jagged editing, and the warped sound design adding to the hallucinogenic feel. But the stunning scenes don't add up to much of a story, and the ending is emptily cryptic.

Оценка - 63 Общая - 69 Нарратив - 5 Сценарий - 5 Постановка - 7 Целостность - 6 Монтаж - 8.5 Выполнение своей цели - 7 Флоу - 6 Личное - 6.5 Атмосфера - 7 Эмоции - 5 Актерская игра - 6.5 Саундтрек - 7.5 Синематографи - 9 Визуал - 9.5 Звук - 7 Продакшн дизайн - 8 Костюмы - 8

The premise I loved, the execution less so.

Had to see it twice. May have to see it again. It's certainly striking. Still not sure if it really hangs together or if it just cheats by going psychedelic rather than think its plot through, but it's got enough ideas and visuals - even if digital b/w still looks flat - that you won't care.

What did I just witness? It gets points for producing some beautiful images, being wholly original, and being bizarrely captivating beyond the first act, but this was an incomprehensible, drug-fueled nightmare that I can't recommend. I know I should just throw the plot out, because it doesn't matter for a movie like this, but I can't. I consider this a missed opportunity to do something great.