Sightseers, the acclaimed comedy from Ben Wheatley, is now streaming for free in the UK.
The film follows Tina (Alice Lowe) and Chris (Steve Oram), a pair of lovers who go on a trip in the British countryside. Despite their bucolic surroundings, the couple’s odyssey turns to blackly-comic violence.
Written by Lowe and Oram, Sightseers is available to stream in the UK via Channel 4, but viewers will have to hurry as it is due to leave the streamer in just under a month’s time on 22 September.
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Featuring Eileen Davis and Jonathan Aris in supporting roles, Sightseers proved to be a hit with critics upon its release in 2012, with the film currently having an impressive approval rating of 86% on Rotten Tomatoes from 106 reviews.
“Director Ben Wheatley and writer-stars Alice Lowe and Steve Oram deliver a wicked road trip movie that successfully walks the line between dark comedy and horror,” noted the site in their critical consensus, while Variety similarly called it a “wicked little pic”.
StudioCanal
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In Digital Spy’s review of the film, we wrote: “[The] lack of emotional depth doesn’t diminish what’s a tremendously enjoyable and consistently surprising tragicomedy, a heightened look at two very broken people in meltdown.”
“Not only is Sightseers a relishable achievement for its devisers, Lowe and Oram, but it enhances Wheatley’s reputation as currently the most refreshingly offbeat and unpredictable director of British crime films,” opined Sight & Sound.
“If you are in the mood for a bizarre tale of how to rid the British countryside of some of society’s modern ills – litterbugs beware – Sightseers should do the trick,” noted the Los Angeles Times, while the London Evening Standard called it “brilliantly funny”.
IFC Films
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The Daily Telegraph was also full of praise as they lauded Lowe and Oram’s script for “nimbly” balancing its tone between “horror and farce”, adding that the comedy was “flesh-creepingly funny”.
If mystery thrillers are more your thing than black comedies, then Channel 4 may have you covered with Where the Crawdads Sing. You’ll have to hurry, however, as the film is due to leave the streamer on Friday.
Sightseers is streaming now on Channel 4.
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Reporter, Digital Spy George is a freelance writer who specialises in Movies and TV. After graduating with a degree in Film Studies and Journalism from De Montfort University, in which he analysed the early works of Richard Linklater for his dissertation, he wrote for several websites for GRV Media. Â His film tastes vary from blockbusters like Mission: Impossible and John Wick to international directors such as Paolo Sorrentino and Hirokazu Kore-eda, and has attended both the London and Berlin film festivals.
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