Sightseers is a 2012 British black comedy film directed by Ben Wheatley and written by and starring Alice Lowe and Steve Oram.
[4] Sightseers was selected to be screened in the Directors' Fortnight section at the 2012 Cannes Film Festival on 23 May 2012, and was released in the United Kingdom on 30 November, by StudioCanal.
Chris is upset with her chaotic approach to the murders, believing himself to be justified in his choice of victims, and they argue before hiding the body at the side of the road.
The characters came together seven years before the film came as a stage experience with Lowe and Oram appearing as innocent campers who slowly revealed they were serial killers.
They put the short online, and it generated some buzz, and Lowe sent the link to Edgar Wright, with whom she had worked on Hot Fuzz.
Lowe and Oram did research into horror literature and even took a caravanning holiday, in character and with a cameraman, to the locations that would go on to be featured in the film.
[7] Ben Wheatley has said that all the locations were very helpful, even after they explained the nature of the film, because they "tried to make sure that it was open and fair to places, and that they weren't the butt of jokes.
The website's critical consensus reads: "Director Ben Wheatley and writer-stars Alice Lowe and Steve Oram deliver a wicked road trip movie that successfully walks the line between dark comedy and horror.
[10] Peter Bradshaw reviewed the film twice for The Guardian, first after its preview at Cannes, when he suggested "Wheatley could be suffering from difficult third album syndrome: this is not as mysterious and interesting as Kill List; its effects are more obvious and the encounters between the naturalistically conceived antiheroes and the incidental, sketch-comedy posh characters is a little uneasy.
"[11] However, he viewed it again on its theatrical release and admitted that "when I first saw it, I think I might have got out of bed the right side" going on to say "a second viewing has further revealed just how superb are the effortless performances of Steve Oram and Alice Lowe, who are the movie's writers (working with Wheatley's longtime co-writer Amy Jump), and whose creative ownership makes a purely auteurist comparison with Kill List slightly less relevant."
He suggests a number of parallels: "an obvious comparison with Mike Leigh's Nuts in May, and there are even traces of Victoria Wood and Alan Bennett, whose gentler, observational comedy is turned into something nightmarish, bringing in an exquisitely horrible Readers' Wives aesthetic", concluding that "[t]he chilling and transgressive flourishes are carried off with deadpan confidence; it's a distinctive and brutally unsettling piece of work.
"[12] Kim Newman wrote in Empire that Sightseers is a "uniquely British blend of excruciating comedy of embarrassment and outright grue, not quite as disorientating in its mood shifts as Kill List, but just as impressive a film.
"[15] The film went on to receive seven BIFA Nominations, including Best Supporting Actress for Eileen Davies,[16][17][18] and winning the award for Best Screenplay.