Not for everyone, this, but then I can't think of a Ben Wheatley film that I couldn't say that of. For those of you who like his stuff, you'll like this. For everyone else, fair enough. You're wrong, but fair enough.
'Sightseers' is basically about a couple who go off into the bland southern countryside and start killing people, but obviously there's a bunch more to the plot than that - I just don't enjoy summing things up unless I don't have much to say about the rest of the movie. But I do. It's filmed in that classic Wheatley style of prolonged overlapping dialogue and transitioning sounds from one scene to the next. There's also that pervading sense on uneasyness that I so enjoy, but there is an undertone of humour here too. Many reviews that I've read for this on complain that there isn't enough humour, but if there was any more it would make this a "dark comedy" (urgh) so I'm more than happy with the bleakness of 'Sightseers'.
I particularly liked the scene where Chris is beating the rambler to death, and Tina is slowly sinking to the ground as we hear some William Blake, before it is suddenly cut off by the final wet whack of Chris's big stick in the rambler's skull.
There's a strong 'Badlands'/'Thelma and Louise'/'Gun Crazy'/'Natural Born Killers'/'Bonnie and Clyde' vibe here, but it's so much fun to see this kind of story play out in the most boring of lands - England. Overall it's just such an insanely, delightfully English film. The mind nummingly boring tourist spots mixed with the piles of background history and the arguably beautiful landscape. The violent anger at littering and the campervans and the dingly fucking dales. It's perfect. It's terrible.
That's what I love most about this movie; it gets all of that right. There's also their messed up relationship and lots of gory deaths to keep us entertained, but that's almost background, for me. The humour never comes to the fore, and is always downplayed by events before and after so that the audience isn't really given a chance to laugh without feeling weird about it. It's great, and you can see where it's all heading (sort of), but you enjoy the ride nonetheless.
I thought they would both be killing themselves at the end, but after thinking about it I prefer this ending far more. During the course of the film Tina has started living, while Chris has slowly become more detached until his only creative expression is planning their suicide. He likes things ordered, while Tina delights in the random, as she continues to break away from her constricting mother. A great couple shots that show this perfectly is when we see Tiny staring, entranced, at the scum swirling randomly in the current of a river. We get a beautiful closeup and it could just as easily be emission nebulas or forest fires, but it's just some pond scum. Chris is scowling down at the same view, and says "I can't look at that anymore" and walks off. In killing himself and taking Tina along on his murderous holiday Chris has shown her how interesting life can be, and given her a second chance. D'awe, happy for her.
I thought they would both be killing themselves at the end, but after thinking about it I prefer this ending far more. During the course of the film Tina has started living, while Chris has slowly become more detached until his only creative expression is planning their suicide. He likes things ordered, while Tina delights in the random, as she continues to break away from her constricting mother. A great couple shots that show this perfectly is when we see Tiny staring, entranced, at the scum swirling randomly in the current of a river. We get a beautiful closeup and it could just as easily be emission nebulas or forest fires, but it's just some pond scum. Chris is scowling down at the same view, and says "I can't look at that anymore" and walks off. In killing himself and taking Tina along on his murderous holiday Chris has shown her how interesting life can be, and given her a second chance. D'awe, happy for her.
Sightseers: 82.0