Out now on demand, Out now on dvd/blu-ray

Sightseers, Movie

Sightseers 2012

Trailers
Reviews
Stuff

A romantic caravan trip around Britain's Lake District becomes a killing spree in this ultra-black comedy from Ben Wheatley (Kill List). Chris (Steve Oram) wants to show his girlfriend Tina (Alice Lowe) some of his favourite scenic spots on their first holiday together. But it doesn't take long for the dream to fade: litterbugs, noisy teenagers and pre-booked caravan sites, not to mention Tina's meddling mother, soon conspire to shatter Chris's dreams and send him, and anyone who rubs him up the wrong way, over a very jagged edge. Not that Tina will let a bit of murder get in the way of true love. More

  Hide

On demand

$6.99
PAY PER PLAY
(48 hr rental)

DVD / Blu-Ray

DVD

$29.99

Blu-ray

$34.99

35 votes / 10 comments The Talk

  • 74 %

    Want to See it

    What say you?

    • TeeOhEnWhy

      Saw it at the NZFF. One of the funniest movies I've seen in a while.

    • bryce

      maybe

    • Karl

      Loved it. So funny but also quite nuanced. My best comedy of 2012.

    • LeeW

      Great acting an the ending was perfect. Fringe awesome!

    • Grant

      Quite disturbingly funny. Great directing, Intriguing characters, nice scenery, well edited perfect ending.

    • Mariah

      It was stupidly funny but I loved the ending

    • Kim

      Quirky, the ultimate black comedy - twisted and unpredictable! Great ending :)

    • Dusty

      Awesome little movie. Funny and unpredictable ending.

    • Debbie-Ross

      We laughed our heads off! No one does black comedy quite like the Brits!

    • Ken

      I'll give it a go

  • CARE TO COMMENT?

    Want to see it?

 

Flicks.co.nz Review

Rating:

  • AGREE? DISAGREE?...

  • Richard

    Complete rubbish. Walked out along with everyone else in the Rialto tonight. Avoid!

comment / reply
Dominic Corry Flicks Writer

Director Ben Wheatley's follow-up to his masterful 2011 thriller Kill List is a much cheerier affair, but fans of the earlier work should appreciate the ultimately all-consuming black comedy on display. More

Playing characters they created on stage years earlier, Steve Oram and Alice Lowe both inhabit their roles so effectively you sometimes feel like you're watching a documentary.

But the principal result is a grounding of the film in a Mike Leigh-esque degree of grim reality, which only makes the subsequent turn of events all the more shocking.

As Oram's Chris sets about killing random strangers who've enraged him with minor crimes like littering, you can't help but picture Larry David appreciating his course of action. This is a film that takes the everyday murderous impulses we all feel towards the other inhabitants of this planet to their unnatural extremes, and it's kind of satisfying on that level.

It's also very funny in the way that only English movies can be, generating much excruciating humour out of the unrelenting grimness of existence and the interaction of marvelously-essayed minor characters.

Wheatley has a gift for almost Malick-ian wistfulness, which feels entirely unique against the overcast English locations. Plus the bicycle pod must be seen to be believed, and has my nomination for Best Supporting Performance By An Inanimate Prop.

Don't let Sightseers pass you by – it's a one of a kind movie from one of the most exciting new directors around, equal parts hilarious; disturbing and wonderful. Hide

The People's Reviews

Rating:

5 ratings and 6 reviews

  • AGREE? DISAGREE?...

  • Stephen

    Complete rubbish. Very violent and barely funny. Don't waste your money on this.

comment / reply

Headline...

Kerry-Priest Wannabe (?)

It was a disturbing yet funny film. If your into dark comedies, this ones for you. I was really worried about Poppy/Banjo for most of the movie which made it hard to enjoy times. The ending was perfect and the film as a whole was well directed and visually stunning.

  • AGREE? DISAGREE?...

comment / reply

A Bleak British Treat

adamatdramatrain Flicks Superstar (?)

If Mike Leigh made a movie about sociopaths it might look something like director Ben Wheatley's 'Sightseers.' Just imagine Leigh's bleak British dramas 'Life is Sweet' or 'Secrets & Lies' - with the odd brutal random killing thrown in...

Lead actors Alice Lowe (who plays "angry faced" Tina), and Steve Oram (who plays "ginger bearded" Chris), also wrote the screenplay and the pair nail the oddball lovers as they tour Britain on a caravan holiday, taking in such highlights as the Crich Tramway and Keswick Pencil museums...

Playing like a low-budget quirky 'Bonnie & Clyde,' anyone familiar with British comic Julia Davis' superb, dark and twisted series 'Nighty Night' (BBC TV, 2004-2005) will know what to expect in turns of off-kilter bleak humour. At one point Chris justifies killing a private school educated rambler by stating: "He wasn't a person - he's a 'Daily Mail' reader." Indeed, in terms of humour, it's no coincidence that this is co-produced by Edgar Wright, whose 'Shaun of the Dead' (2004) and 'Hot Fuzz' (2007) contain a similar vein of humour in which extreme violence and mundane British characters combine to create comedy by juxtaposition.

For me, it's a film that sparkles in the dialogue and the lead actors, for whom murder is hobby akin to knitting saucy woollen underwear. If you liked Richard Ayoade's 'Submarine' (2010), then 'Sightseers' is the latest treat in a long line of bleakly humorous Brit black comedies that stretch back to the likes of Malcolm McDowell in Lindsay Anderson's 'If' (1968).

But 'Sightseers' lacks the satirical punch of Lindsay Anderson or the underlying dramatic depth of a Mike Leigh movie, and whilst it begins as a great sick joke with a wonderfully apt soundtrack ('Tainted Love' is a standout here), it runs out of steam by the third act, leaving the characters and narrative nowhere to go.

As a short this would have been superb but, for me at least, it doesn't have enough going on to maintain the feature-length runtime.

That said - it's a bleak British treat that is sure to be a cult favourite - and it's certainly an enjoyable watch if you possess a penchant for grotesque characters in a murderously twisted caravanning take on the road movie.

  • AGREE? DISAGREE?...

comment / reply

Blah blah kill

RealityCheck Flicks Superstar (?)

Sightseers
Crazy fringe film festival sorta flick if ever I saw one. Right up there with 'Bad Taste', 'Bad Boy Bubby', 'Bad Santa', 'Superbad' and 'Hitchhikers Guide to the Universe' :-) I loved it. Truely a strange and odd movie and following the lives of these two nearly paired couple in their all too real dealings (killings) with others they encounter.Set in the UK but could've easily been a NZ writern and set film. For all you freaks out there that like a touch or normal with your deaths...
Genre : Horror, comedy, satire
3/5 : bit lengthy, but enjoyed the character build up as the movie progressed, a good watch

  • AGREE? DISAGREE?...

comment / reply

Not one for the girls

Gill Nobody (?)

Did not like the film at all, wish I hadn't seen it. Found all the characters very unlikeable. It was far too graphically violent for me and looked away for the most part. I think that the idea of a film about retribution was good, and yet they lost me by having the main characters violently killing people that had disgruntled them in some way, this was many steps too far for me. I didn't find it funny at all. We went to see it because we are British, knew a lot of the settings and British films are usually very watchable, sadly this one for me was not. Had I not been with someone else I too like other viewers would have walked out. Definitely a black film minus the comedy in my opinion, avoid.

  • AGREE? DISAGREE?...

comment / reply

A bit rubbish

Deb Flicks Superstar (?)

Worst movie I've seen this year. Missed e mark horribly. Shame.

  • AGREE? DISAGREE?...

comment / reply

Don't get it.

Red Flicks Superstar (?)

Didn't find this funny...

Your rating / review...

Rate it:

Review it:

After submitting your review, you will need to login or signup to Flicks. Don't worry though, we'll keep your review and post it after you're done.

Press Reviews

Empire (UK)

Serves as a black-comic state-of-the-nation address. Full review.

Guardian (UK)

Reservations are offset by the absolute confidence and visual style that Wheatley always shows. Full review.

Hollywood Reporter

Very British blend of quirky character-comedy and homicidal violence has all the makings of a midnight-movie cult classic. Full review.

Little White Lies (UK)

Does for caravanning what Deliverance did for canoeing. Full review.

Total Film (UK)

At first Father Ted cute, but then League Of Gentlemen cruel - a combination that Wheatley never lets curdle - this is a dark little delight. Full review.