Coyote...

 

Coyote...

"Uprising" is Greengrass at his most creative laziness

 

The exciting, innovative director, Paul Greengrass, returns in the historical rebellion drama, The Uprising. Whereas he's done wonders with historical fiction (United 93) and espionage thrillers (The Bourne Supremacy and Ultimatum), he's a bit out of his element here. The Uprising isn't so much a historical drama, as it is a slogfest - one that moves way too fast, for its own good.

After the young King Richard II increases taxes on his British populace, some of the British don't much care for it. The young ploughman (Andrew Garfield), a bitter man who's lost his family to the black plague, rebels. His defiance leads to further revolts across the land, and soon the commoners are meeting with the king, attempting to petition him.

The movie delivers the rebellion way too early in the going, without developing the main players as people who are complex and human. It's as if Greengrass had three hours of usable footage, and had to sacrifice a good deal of it when the studio heads told him to trim the movie to two hours. It also features plenty of shots of gray skies, desolate landscapes, and overall bleakness abundant in mud and dirt. Nevertheless, the movie fails to work as a drama, as an action movie, as much of anything worth remembering. Unfortunately.

☆☆