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Peterloo
**
Dir: Mike Leigh
Starring: Rory Kinnear, Maxine Peake, Pearce Quigley
(UK, 12A, 2hrs 34mins)
Mike Leigh embarks on his biggest, most ambitious project yet, the epic tale of a pro-democracy rally in Manchester in 1819 brutally quelled by British forces. What could have been an excoriating, bruising account of a deaf government ignorant of its people (rather pertinent nowadays) becomes a talky, rhetoric-fueled history lesson that only fitfully bursts into life.
Taking a broad approach to the historical events and with a bewildering cast list that requires scrutiny and dedication, Peterloo initially follows a soldier, played by David Moorst returning home to the North from Waterloo, only to move on to other characters from different classes. We meet his mother and father, Nellie and Joshua (Maxine Peake and Pearce Quigley) as they become embroiled in radical meetings bemoaning the unfeeling politicians of London. We meet Karl Johnson’s Home Secretary, Robert Wilfort’s Prime Minister and Tim McInnery’s outrageous Prince Regent, all fearing a French-style revolution on Britain’s city streets.
This culminates in a gathering of 80,000 people in St Peter’s Field near Manchester, there to listen to a progressive but egocentric landowner Henry Hunt (a scenery-chewing Rory Kinnear). At the time, landowners were getting richer at the expense of the poor by denying wage increases, leading to unrest, Hunt wanted a better deal for workers.
Unfortunately, as he speaks, a nervous cavalry charges the crowd killing 18 people and injuring countless others. Leigh makes the actual incident visceral and unsettling, but the build-up has been somewhat of a slog, narratively unfocused in it’s bid to provide a history lesson and with often pompous, patronizing language.
Britain needs a film like Peterloo now, a film that deals with the rich monopolising the poor, aided by an unfeeling government in charge – the relevance is undeniable. It’s a shame Leigh has smothered his central message with so much bluster and historical detail that the point is lost. A shorter, sharper take on the events would have had more impact than this slavishly-observed, although handsomely-mounted, endurance test.
words Keiron Self
Out now in cinemas