Cinema Review: Trespass Against Us


Posted February 27, 2017 in Cinema Reviews

Trespass Against Us

Director: Adam Smith

Talent: Michael Fassbender, Brendan Gleeson, Lyndsey Marshall, Rory Kinnear

Released: 3rd March

 

There is a great deal wrong with this film about Chad, a Traveller man (Fassbender), struggling to escape the criminal enterprise of his father Colby (Gleeson), become settled and provide a quiet life for his young family. Complaints about its depiction of the Travelling community will no doubt be widespread, and entirely valid, hitting as it does all the right Sindo-reader bogeyman buttons: they rob a judge’s mansion, Colby preaches flat earth theory, Chad kills a policeman’s dog, etc.

Damning social considerations aside, this is a poorly acted, uneven and half-hearted film whose central father-son relationships fail to intrigue or engage. However, it does contain some decent car chases (Chad is an expert getaway driver), and goes some way to depicting the police force as a malign and oppressive force in their treatment of Travellers. These are small saving graces though in a film as ill-advised as it is dull.

Words – Oisín Murphy-Hall

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