Archipelago (2010 film)

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Archipelago
ARCHIPELAGO Film Poster.jpg
UK cinema release poster for Archipelago
Directed by Joanna Hogg
Written byJoanna Hogg
Produced byGayle Griffiths
Starring Tom Hiddleston
Kate Fahy
Lydia Leonard
Amy Lloyd
Christopher Baker
CinematographyEd Rutherford
Edited byHelle Le Fevre
Production
company
Wild Horses Film Company
Distributed by Artificial Eye (UK)
Release dates
  • 22 October 2010 (2010-10-22)(London Film Festival)
  • 4 March 2011 (2011-03-04)(UK & Ireland)
Running time
114 minutes
CountryUnited Kingdom
LanguageEnglish

Archipelago is a 2010 British drama film written and directed by Joanna Hogg and starring Tom Hiddleston, Kate Fahy, Lydia Leonard, Amy Lloyd, and Christopher Baker. [1] The plot is about a family holiday on the island of Tresco, which forms part of the archipelago of the Isles of Scilly.

Contents

Plot

Edward is in the throes of a quarter-life crisis. He recently quit his job in the city to travel to Africa, where he will perform volunteer work to promote safe sex and combat the spread of AIDS. To see him off, his mother Patricia and sister Cynthia have organised a family holiday and bon voyage party in a cottage in Tresco on the Isles of Scilly. An invitation has also been extended to Patricia's estranged husband, who expresses the vague intention of attending.

His mother and sister have deemed this a family-only holiday and have forbidden Edward to bring Chloe, his girlfriend, much to his irritation. Even with the exclusion of Chloe, they have nonetheless invited some outsiders: Christopher, a local artist who has been hired to teach Patricia how to paint the beautiful surrounding landscapes, and Rose, a professional cook.

Things start to fall apart, and the trip quickly turns into mental crisis, anxiety and resentment. Edward starts to wonder if his mother and sister have created this whole holiday with ulterior motives of their own. He seems all too ready to be talked out of his trip to Africa, as he doesn't have the slightest idea what to do with his life afterwards - and comes close to trying to seduce Rose.

The bitter brother-sister relationship between Edward and Cynthia boils over during the holiday and comes to a head after Edward thinks that not inviting Rose to sit with them at the table is ridiculous. Cynthia insists that because Rose has been hired as a cook, asking her to join them would be uncomfortable. To make up for it, they invite her to a restaurant meal, which Cynthia spoils by complaining and making a fuss about the food until Edward angrily walks out.

Edward's Africa trip begins to look unlikely, upstaged by the exotic beauty of the Isles of Scilly. Fed up by the family's constant arguing, Rose decides to leave earlier than she had planned. She leaves a note in the kitchen for Edward to find. Towards the end, Edward and Cynthia reconcile with each other and with their mother before bidding Christopher farewell. Without ever having seen Patricia's husband, the trio pack up and say goodbye to the house. They board a helicopter back to the mainland and go back to their everyday lives.

Cast

Production

The film was shot on location on Tresco, Isles of Scilly in 2009. It is produced by Wild Horses Films. Several people who live and work on Tresco appear in the film and are credited as themselves.

Release

Archipelago premiered at the Pusan International Film Festival in 2010, and had its UK premiere at the 2010 BFI London Film Festival, where it was nominated for Best Film. [2] It was released in the UK by Curzon Artificial Eye on 4 March 2011, [3] and in France on 15 December 2021. [4]

Reception

Critical response

The film has been very well received critically. [5] [6] [7] Archipelago has an approval rating of 96% on review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, based on 25 reviews, and an average rating of 7.7/10. The website's critical consensus states: "Sad, funny, and wise in equal measure, Archipelago finds writer-director Joanna Hogg in remarkably strong, confident form". [8] Metacritic assigned the film a weighted average score of 82 out of 100, based on 9 critics, indicating "universal acclaim". [9]

Peter Bradshaw of The Guardian gave the film five stars. [10] It has provoked much comment and debate, particularly focused on its social setting and distinctive cinematic style. [11] [12] [13]

Comedian Stewart Lee briefly references Archipelago in his 2012 standup show Carpet Remnant World, where he describes it as "an art film about middle-class people on a disappointing holiday". [14]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Tresco, Isles of Scilly</span> Human settlement in England

Tresco is the second-biggest island of the Isles of Scilly. It is 297 ha (1.15 sq mi) in area, measuring about 3.5 km (2.2 mi) by 1.75 km (1.09 mi).

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Isles of Scilly Steamship Company</span> Transport company

The Isles of Scilly Steamship Company (ISSC) operates the principal shipping service from Penzance, in Cornwall, to the Isles of Scilly, located 28 miles (45 km) to the southwest. It provides a year-round cargo service together with a seasonal passenger service in summer. The name of the company's principal ferry, the Scillonian III, is perhaps better known than that of the company itself.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cromwell's Castle</span> Castle in Tresco, Isles of Scilly, Cornwall, UK

Cromwell's Castle is an artillery fort overlooking New Grimsby harbour on the island of Tresco in the Isles of Scilly. It comprises a tall, circular gun tower and an adjacent gun platform, and was designed to prevent enemy naval vessels from entering the harbour. The castle was built in two phases; Sir Robert Blake constructed the tower between 1651 and 1652 in the aftermath of the Parliamentary invasion of the islands at the end of the English Civil War, and Master Gunner Abraham Tovey added the gun platform during the War of Jenkins' Ear around 1739. The tower fell into disuse soon afterwards, and in the 21st century is managed by English Heritage and open to visitors.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">King Charles's Castle</span> 16th century castle in the Isles of Scilly

King Charles's Castle is a ruined artillery fort overlooking New Grimsby harbour on the island of Tresco in the Isles of Scilly. Built between 1548 and 1551 to protect the islands from French attack, it would have held a battery of guns and an accompanying garrison, designed to prevent enemy vessels from entering the harbour. The castle is polygonal in design, constructed from granite stone, with the gun battery at the front, and a dining room, kitchen and living accommodation at the rear. An additional defensive earthwork was constructed around it during the 17th century. The design of the castle is unusual for the period, and is only seen elsewhere in blockhouses along the River Thames.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">St Helen's, Isles of Scilly</span>

St Helen's is one of the fifty or so uninhabited islands in the archipelago of the Isles of Scilly and has an approximate area of 0.1885 square kilometres. On the south side of the island is one of the earliest Christian sites in Scilly, an early medieval religious complex, which is thought to be the remains of St Elidius Hermitage, an 8th-century chapel lived in by Saint Lide,. There are also the remains of an isolation hospital used to quarantine sailors with plague. The island is the major part of a Site of Special Scientific Interest and some features have been given the designation of scheduled ancient monument. Access to the island is through chartered or private boat, although there are some season trips throughout the summer. St Helen's is currently managed by the Isles of Scilly Wildlife Trust.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Teän</span>

Teän is an uninhabited island to the north of the Isles of Scilly archipelago between Tresco, 1.5 kilometres (0.9 mi) to the west, and St Martin's, 300 metres (330 yd) to the east. Approximately 16 hectares in area, the island consists of a series of granite tors with the highest point, Great Hill, rising to 40 metres (130 ft) at its eastern end. The low-lying land is overlain with glacial till and outwash gravels with glacial erratics abundant on the north coast beaches, which indicates the southern limit of outwash from an ice sheet for which it is designated a Geological Conservation Review site.

Kate Fahy, Lady Pryce, is an Irish actress and director. She is known primarily for playing Patricia in Joanna Hogg's 2010 film Archipelago and playing Stevie in Edward Albee's play The Goat or Who is Sylvia at the Almeida Theatre and the Apollo West End. She has worked extensively in theatre, film and television since 1971.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Tom Hiddleston</span> English actor (born 1981)

Thomas William Hiddleston is an English actor. He gained international fame portraying Loki in the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU), starting with Thor in 2011 and most recently in Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania in 2023, additionally headlining the Disney+ series Loki in 2021.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Isles of Scilly</span> Group of islands off the south-westernmost point of mainland Britain

The Isles of Scilly is an archipelago off the southwestern tip of Cornwall, England, United Kingdom. One of the islands, St Agnes, is the most southerly point in the British Isles, being over four miles further south than the most southerly point of the British mainland at Lizard Point.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">St Mary's Old Church, St Mary's</span> Church in Cornwall, England

St Mary's Old Church, St Mary's is a parish church in the Church of England located in Old Town on St Mary's, Isles of Scilly, Cornwall, United Kingdom.

Tamarisk, or Tamarisk House, is a house belonging to the Duchy of Cornwall, on St Mary's in the Isles of Scilly, in the United Kingdom off the coast of Cornwall.

<i>Unrelated</i> 2007 British film

Unrelated is a 2007 British drama film written and directed by Joanna Hogg, starring Kathryn Worth, Tom Hiddleston, Mary Roscoe, David Rintoul and Henry Lloyd-Hughes. It was released in the US on 20 February 2008.

Prince Caspian and The Voyage of the Dawn Treader is the second series of The Chronicles of Narnia that ran from 1988 to 1990. The series, which was shown on BBC television in 1989, is an adaptation of two of C. S. Lewis's The Chronicles of Narnia novels: Prince Caspian (1951) and The Voyage of the Dawn Treader (1952).

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Joanna Hogg</span> British film director and screenwriter (born 1960)

Joanna Hogg is a British film director and screenwriter. She made her directorial and screenwriting feature film debut in 2007 with Unrelated followed by Archipelago (2010), Exhibition (2013), The Souvenir (2019), The Souvenir Part II (2021), and The Eternal Daughter (2022). Two of her films topped the Sight & Sound annual poll for best film in their respective years, receiving nominations at the British Independent Film Awards, the Independent Spirit Awards and at the Berlin International Film Festival.

Christopher William Baker RBA is an English landscape painter, watercolourist, draughtsman and author from Sussex, England.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Lower Moors (St Mary's)</span>

The Lower Moors is a wetland between Hugh Town and Old Town Bay on St Mary's, the largest island in the Isles of Scilly. The Isles of Scilly are an archipelago off the southwestern tip of the Cornish peninsula of Great Britain.

<i>Exhibition</i> (film) 2013 British film

Exhibition is a 2013 drama film written and directed by Joanna Hogg, starring Viv Albertine, Liam Gillick, and Tom Hiddleston. The film premiered at the Locarno Film Festival in August 2013, and was released in the UK on 25 April 2014.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Old Blockhouse</span> Scheduled monument in Scilly, UK

The Old Blockhouse, also known as the Dover Fort, is a 16th-century fortification on the island of Tresco in the Isles of Scilly. It was built between 1548 and 1551 by the government of Edward VI to protect the islands against French attack.

<i>A Quiet Passion</i> 2016 British film

A Quiet Passion is a 2016 British biographical film written and directed by Terence Davies about the life of American poet Emily Dickinson. The film stars Cynthia Nixon as the reclusive poet. It co-stars Emma Bell as young Dickinson, Jennifer Ehle, Duncan Duff, and Keith Carradine. The film premiered at the 66th Berlin International Film Festival in February 2016 and was released in the United Kingdom on 7 April 2017. It won the Grand Prix at Film Fest Gent.

The Isles of Scilly are an archipelago 45 km (28 mi) off Land's End, Cornwall. Little of the fauna on, above or in the seas surrounding the isles was described prior to the 19th century, when birds and fish started to be described. Most records of other animals date from the 20th century onwards.

References

  1. ↑ Dargis, Manohla (26 June 2014). "Mixed Emotions at a Gathering to Say Goodbye". The New York Times.
  2. ↑ McCabe, Joanne (29 September 2010). "London Film Festival 2010: Shortlist for Best Film Award revealed". Metro. Retrieved 11 October 2012.
  3. ↑ Barraclough, Leo (17 September 2010). "Artificial Eye nabs 'Archipelago'". Variety. Retrieved 14 February 2011.
  4. ↑ "Archipelago (2011) - Film de Joanna Hogg". Meilleurs-Films.fr (in French). Retrieved 11 December 2021.
  5. ↑ Calhoun, Dave (3 March 2011). "Archipelago Review". Timeout. Retrieved 9 March 2011.
  6. ↑ French, Philip (6 March 2011). "Archipelago – review". The Guardian . Retrieved 9 March 2011.
  7. ↑ Sandhu, Sukhdev (3 March 2011). "Archipelago, review". The Telegraph.
  8. ↑ https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/archipelago
  9. ↑ https://www.metacritic.com/movie/archipelago?ftag=MCD-06-10aaa1c
  10. ↑ Bradshaw, Peter (3 March 2011). "Archipelago – review". The Guardian. Retrieved 9 March 2011.
  11. ↑ Pattison, Michael (10 February 2011). "Michael Pattison's idFilm – Commentaries and Contributions". idFilm.
  12. ↑ Leigh, Danny (25 February 2011). "Posh pushovers: why do films squeeze out the middle classes?". The Guardian.
  13. ↑ Cox, David (14 March 2011). "Is Archipelago a class act or an empty gesture?". The Guardian.
  14. ↑ Lee, Stewart (8 December 2013). "Scooby Doo Thatcher Routine". Stewart Lee. Retrieved 4 April 2018.
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