Peterloo

Like most working-class Brits, I knew nothing of Peterloo (and I am from Manchester into the bargain).

Mike Leigh has done an excellent job, documenting this momentous event in British history, an event conveniently airbrushed out of my secondary school education. Imagine that.

A good 2.5 hrs long, it would make a decent 12 part Netflix drama. Though, he'd never get the funding for that.

It is long, it is educational, it is historical, it is incredibly worthy. Watch it and draw parallels with the Britain of today. FPTP electoral system, zero-hours contracts, food banks, Brexit, et al.

i gave it a 9.

Peterloo is the Best Mike Leigh picture I've seen. Yes it is too long & speech filled but the Manchester massacre of 1819 is horribly dramatic. You see how the forces of the status quo combine to send in the cavalry & yeomanry to charge at peaceful protestors, maiming hundreds and killing 15. The protestors wanted the right to vote, reform in Parliament (Manchester didn't have an MP) & lower food prices. The film is very well shot with an excellent performance as always from Maxime Peake. Oddly after a long build up to the massacre there is no focus on what happened afterwards.

A slow work up to the massacre. Incredible massacre scene. Would have like more on the aftermath as the film ended abruptly. Overlong I thought.

Quite a long film, but it didn't drag. Tells the story well, but there are really no lead characters, and many of the characters are rather two-dimensional or even caricatures. Visually, it is excellent. I didn't know much about the Peterloo massacre before seeing the film. I now feel educated, and felt that it was two and a half hours well spent, although not a film without flaws. Stronger (more realistically human) characters could perhaps have made the film more engaging, but maybe telling the (hi)story was more important here.

If I have a criticism of this film, it would be that it's half an hour too long. Mike can be a bit self indulgent, there where a few scenes that were just there for colour. Technically accomplished, well acted, and faithfully accurate to the history. If you like social history you will not be disappointed.