Ploughman's Lunch (1983)

In this award winning film James Penfield has made a career out of journalism and now bankrupt finds himself with a group of others in the middle of this politic ridden British homeland at the time the Falklands War obsession trying to make sense of it all.System Requirements:Running Time - 107 min.Format: DVD MOVIE Genre: DRAMA Rating: R UPC: 692865132332 Manufacturer No: T-1323 Product Description

Just to counter the last review

Actually makes plenty of sense--one of the sharpest cinematic critiques of Thatcherism at a time in which British film makers and artists were inspired by the multifold negative impact of her regime in power to produce many such compelling critiques. A compelling critique as well of the news media, of levels of social and cultural pretense, hypocrisy, exploitation, and venality, and of the fabrication of truth and honor. A film that requires intelligence and careful attention but well worth it and with points that are as relevant to the mass manufacturing, packaging, and abusive promotion and exploitation of war for political gain--as well as widespread complicity in this duplicity, especially on the part of the corporate news media--today as at the time it was made and released if not moreso. August 25, 2007

Inside look at a circumscribed world of British journalism

Set during the time of the Faulkland (Malvinas) Island war, our protagonist is an opportunistic journalist played with the appropriate cynicism-- by Jonathan Pryce--whose demeanor seems set with an expression that synthesizes concern, irony, jadedness, and disgust. He maneuvers among the intellectual set of Britian--insinuating himself into the right circles to enhance is career as he bursts out in laughter at a friend's poetry reading, shows utter disdain toward a group of 'peaceniks" and impatiently checks his watch at his mother's funeral since he has more important things to attend to. A rather interesting portrait of intellectual hypocrisy and double-dealings among those whom many intellectuals admire because they do not see beneath the veneer of concern and the search for truth that hides the motivation that is at the heart self-promotion for many in the literati set. June 19, 2007

Made little sense.

Maybe you have to be intimate with the history of the Falkland Islands to understand what's going on in this movie. I rented it because Ian McEwan wrote the screenplay, and because I usually enjoy Jonathan Pryce. But the movie makes about as much sense as the run-on sentence above in the "Product Description." July 7, 2006

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