****MASSIVE SPOILER***(The film and this review is spoiled and terrible) I saw trailers for this film last year and thought, this film looks like the sort of thing I'd like. The cinematography appeared ethereal and dreamy. The cast was interesting and I thought I'd found another independent gem for my collection of pseudo intellectual DVDs and blu-Rays I leave lying around to show how clever I am.This film is weak. Area Stark is vapid and stares off into space a lot. Maxine Peak is good, she's literally the best thing in this film. The film is not scary, don't be fooled by the trailers into thinking this film has some sort of supernatural haunting quality. It's literally a film about two girls, one is slutty, the other one isn't, and then the non slutty has really gross sex with her brother and her mum catches them. So I guess they're both slutty. Oh and there is some fainting at school. Then non slutty brother sexer gets expelled (maybe she was excelled before the sex? Who cares, it doesn't matter) The end.So yeah, spoilers, but I've really just saved you two hours of your life that's you'd never get back, k.

Whilst taking a look on Youtube at trailers for upcoming movies I stumbled on a review by British critic Mark "big hands" Kermode on a stylish-looking Supernatural Drama.Walking home a few weeks later,I decided to take a look in a local second hand DVD store,and I was delighted to spot the official DVD being sold for only £2! Which led to me getting ready to fall into the falling.The plot-England 1969:Desperate to get away from her single, agoraphobic mum, Lydia starts to develop a close friendship with Abbie,who gets up to mischievous activities at the all-girls school with Lydia.Whilst Lydia is nervous around boys,Abbie dives right in,and ends up getting pregnant. As Abbie and Lydia try to keep the pregnancy hidden at the school,they both start to suffer from a fainting spell.Hit by a strong case of the fainting spell,the still-pregnant Abbie dies on the school floor in a coma-like state. Grieving over Abbie's death,Lydia starts to explore the power from her mysterious fainting,as the fainting spell spreads across the entire school.View on the film:Backed by a shimmering acoustic indie score from Tracey Thorn,writer/director Carol Morley & cinematographer Agnès Godard give the film (produced by Luc "son of Nic" Roeg) a lush supernatural green which is rubbed up against the rising damp of the late '60s.Splicing subliminal images into the title, Morley touches on the supernatural with a real delicacy,as light greens and deep river blues surrounding the girls gives the fainting spell a magical, rustic quality,which also subtly connects to the loss of childhood for Lydia.As a fainting epidemic covers the school,Morley keeps Lydia's home life firmly grounded,with each room being covered in dour wallpaper and thick clouds of cigarette smoke,which Lydia tries to escape from by curling up in claustrophobic corners of the rooms.Staying away from overtly stepping into Horror territory,Morley brilliantly uses the supernatural element in the screenplay to give the movie a deeply unsettling atmosphere,thanks to the mass fainting heightening the grief that Lydia is gripped by,which slowly covers the school in a psychologically horrific mass hysteria.For the central relationship between Lydia & Abbie,Morley entwines the girls in a fragile,obsessive bond,as Abbie's exploration of her sexuality presses down on Lydia's fear of loneliness.Cast adrift by the loss of Abbie, (played by a superb Florence Pugh) Morley makes the tough rules of Lydia's (played by a powerfully raw Maisie Williams) school open up the raw nerves of Lydia's grief,thanks to the closed emotions sending Lydia's fear and terror across the school like a magik myth,whose spell is cast in a hauntingly ambiguous final note by Morley,as the school falls into the falling.

Loved everything about this film; the music, cinematography and imagery; it really did conjure another world. The attention to detail captured the era perfectly and completely transported me back to those hormonal and angsty teenage years. I don't think I've ever known the subject of mass hysteria tackled before, but this film really captures the essence of it and made it at once believable yet subject to scepticism. Loved the setting: the kitchen hairdresser, overalls and crockery; the outward elegance of the school hiding the severe regime within; all evocative of the time. What goes unsaid, self denial and restraint hiding a myriad of secrets and emotions. The ending really moved me, and I think provided explanations if you needed them. The teachers are typical of a strict religious education with their stiff etiquette and austere asexuality. Not a 'Mrs' among them with their odd ways and antiquated rules. Greta Scacchi was a complete tour de force. I couldn't decide if I wanted to hit her or hug her! And Maxine Peake was, well, as wonderful as she always is. Her expressions/non-expressions conveying her entrapment in her own kitchen and her undisclosed past.

Regardless of how beautifully filmed; wonderfully acted; craftily directed, and sympathetically scored a film may be, without a half decent plot and script, it will 'fall' flat on it's face. I think that the majority of reviews here, question the credulity of those individuals and organisations who deemed it fit to invest good cash in this farrago of misplaced ideas and concepts. Sad, really, because, retaining the cast and film-crew, (not the film editors, or appalling film score), with a good, powerful, intelligent script, this could have been so much the better. Instead, what we get are anecdotal stereotypes of stock characters, uttering senseless, sixth-form 'man that's sooo deep', lines, with every metaphorical visual cliché that you could imagine. And the ending? someone could have had the decency to properly edit Maxine Peake's movements, even if that was the most predictable cliché of them all. I'll tell you what would have been better - final close-up of Lydia's sleeping, twitching face. Slowly, she opens her eyes and stares into camera. Ultra CU of one final, heroic twitch as she mouths the line..."And yeah, it was all a dream" CUT!