Film

Movie theaters, reviews and showtimes in New York, plus articles, trailers and more

 

Laughterhouse (1984)

Director: Richard Eyre

Average user rating
No reviews

Movie review

From Time Out Film Guide

When one of farmer Holm's pluckers loses a joint off his finger in the plucking machine and the TGWU block the transport of his Christmas geese to market, he determines to take them on foot from Norfolk to Smithfield. The anti-union stance is soon conveniently dropped as the trek turns into a protest against factory farming, with another bunch of media shits (cf The Ploughman's Lunch) tagging along for the story. Presumably intended as a tribute to the continuing virtues of British pluck, the result is rather more off-putting than stirring. The main problem is that Eyre, as in the past, seems unable to invest his characters with a modicum of sympathy. That the film should have been 'inspired' by Howard Hawks' Red River is a point best glossed over. Comparisons are indeed odious.

Author: JP

Time Out Film Guide


  • Print this page
  • Send to a friend

What do you think?
Post your review now

clear rating
Min 1 star. Zero stars will be treated as unrated.

*mandatory fields


Cast & crew

Director: Richard Eyre

Producer: Ann Scott

Cast: Ian Holm, Penelope Wilton, Bill Owen, Richard Hope, Stephen Moore, Rosemary Martin full cast

Duration: 93 mins




Features

Street fighting men

Street fighting men

BAM celebrates John Carpenter’s sci-fi-inflected rage against the machine.

Zoom in:

Zoom in:

They Live's Roddy Piper

The American experience

British comedian Steve Coogan gets in touch with his inner Yank in <em>Hamlet 2.</em>

Spanish intuition

Scarlett Johansson and Rebecca Hall flirt away an Iberian summer in Vicky Cristina Barcelona.

Shadows and frogs

Crime pays in Film Forum’s expansive French noir series.

Strip tease

IFC’s new midnight-movie series revisits Hollywood’s groovy ’60s scene.

To air is human

Man on Wire, a new doc about a surreal Manhattan morning, aims high.