Peterloo (2018)

The story of the 1819 Peterloo Massacre where British forces attacked a peaceful pro-democracy rally in Manchester.

Director:

Mike Leigh

Writer:

Mike Leigh

Stars:

Rory Kinnear, Maxine Peake, Neil Bell

2 wins & 8 nominations.

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Rory Kinnear	...	Henry Hunt
Maxine Peake	...	Nellie
Pearce Quigley	...	Joshua
David Moorst	...	Joseph
Rachel Finnegan	...	Mary
Tom Meredith	...	Robert
Simona Bitmate	...	Esther
Robert Wilfort	...	Lord Liverpool, the Prime Minister
Karl Johnson	...	Lord Sidmouth, the Home Secretary
Sam Troughton	...	Mr. Hobhouse
Roger Sloman	...	Mr. Grout
Kenneth Hadley	...	Mr. Golightly
Tom Edward-Kane	...	Mr. Cobb
Lizzy McInnerny	...	Mrs. Moss
Alastair Mackenzie	...	General Sir John Byng

Storyline

An epic portrayal of the events surrounding the infamous 1819 Peterloo Massacre, where a peaceful pro-democracy rally at St Peter's Field in Manchester turned into one of the bloodiest and most notorious episodes in British history. The massacre saw British government forces charge into a crowd of over 60,000 that had gathered to demand political reform and protest against rising levels of poverty. Many protesters were killed and hundreds more injured, sparking a nationwide outcry but also further government suppression. The Peterloo Massacre was a defining moment in British democracy which also played a significant role in the founding of The Guardian newspaper.

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Plot Keywords:

manchester | year 1819 | rally | protest rally | prime minister | 

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Genres:

Drama | History

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Motion Picture Rating (MPAA)

Rated PG-13 for a sequence of violence and chaos

Details

Official Sites:

Official site Official site

Country:

UK

Language:

English

Release Date:

5 April 2019 (USA)

Also Known As:

Peterloo

Filming Locations:

Hebden Bridge, West Yorkshire, England, UK

Box Office

Opening Weekend USA:

$26,002, 7 April 2019

Gross USA:

$151,971

Cumulative Worldwide Gross:

$1,998,945

Company Credits

Production Co:

BFI Film Fund, Film4, Thin Man Films

Technical Specs

Runtime:

154 min

Color:

Color Color (ACES)

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

The film Peterloo will mark the 200th anniversary of the notorious Peterloo Massacre.

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Goofs

A British officer uses the word "normalcy" which had not been "invented" until American President Warren Harding misspoke during his 1920 run for President.

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Connections

Referenced in Granada Reports: 16 August 2018: Evening Bulletin (2018)

User Reviews

His epics are somehow better than his social dramas

Rather his intimate eye scales beautifully into epics. This is an unusually progressive work as it shows a future of cinema as collective vs. collective. It is about theater, not politics (or they would say the reverse). It takes 'the speech' and brings it out dozens with many variations like poets trading on the stage. Its subject is persuasion, in moving the chess of collectives through the power of oration. "I don't understand what she's saying." The one did not understand as in the abstract, as in "am I the only one realizing this gibberish has nothing to do with anything?" It's not clear the others understand either, but they're taken. This is how movements instigate is not logically but mutual quantity, and I notice it with cinema that at some point in the last ten years they began to stop striving to engage individuals and began speaking to entire demographics bringing this effect of a backward market. What they found is audiences can't tell the difference. With Peterloo, critics had it reversed that the build-up was a chore. The slaughter was usual. The speeches were new. Some criticized Leigh for making the villains caricatures, but he hates them... but yes they're very much Sweeney Todd without the dicing. Scratch that. Without the songs. Well there's some songs. "What will the year 1900 be like?" This threw me for a loop not just for its irony of 'more of the same indefinitely' but I am looking into a film which is projecting a hundred years ahead to what already happened a century ago. And how does one wrap their mind around this? There are so many realities played with at once while the film attempts to subvert its own reality before our eyes as a sort of meta-theater. Its beauty is it's a densely staged work of theater about characters watching the reality play out before them as theater become real through its deathly consequences. Even when they assemble to watch they're eating snacks as if in the theater. They want a voice and only actors and orators can provide this in a grand way, who are brought in as if rolling tanks down the road. The voice is their great 19th century nuclear weapon. It's festive. A ritual proving they can be heard. Proving that they exist.