The Uprising (2026)

There aren’t many people you’d follow into the muck and filth of 1381 England, but Greengrass is one of them.

Paul Greengrass returns to our cinemas with The Uprising, once again bringing real-life events to the big screen, a tale that portrays the Peasants’ Revolt of 1381. As far as I’m concerned, there’s no better director to offer us versions of true-life tales in the most visceral way possible; this is a man who has given us historical lessons already with Bloody Sunday (2002), as well as representing horrors like 9/11 (2006’s United 93) and the 2011 Norway attacks (2018’s 22 July).

Going all the way back to the fourteenth century for his thirteenth feature film is an interesting move, and the first question you find yourself asking is can Greengrass apply his inimitable hand-held jerky camera style to such a time and place successfully?

Well, the answer to that specific question is unequivocally yes. Andrew Garfield takes the lead role as Ploughman, a man mourning the loss of his wife and two children during the plague, and now one of many people who have reached the end of their tether with a king (Woody Norman as King Richard II) who treats the country’s people like the dirt they seem to inhabit in what is a quite wretched-looking England. One day, when asked to provide proof of his family’s death, he roars at the taxman that “we’ve given you enough!” leading to a violent scuffle that ultimately sparks the titular revolt.

Greengrass plays fast and loose with historical accuracy. Ploughman soon meets two individuals who were actually part of the revolt: Jamie Bell’s priest John Ball and Cosmo Jarvis’s rebel leader Wat Tyler, but certainly towards the end of the piece, it becomes clear for those in the know that artistic license has been well and truly applied to much of what unfurls. Also added to the ranks of Ploughman's close allies is Thomasin McKenzie’s Alyce, an individual who ultimately adds little to proceedings save for being quite an irritating presence for most of the film.

Once we’ve met our merry band of revolters, they unite the masses to march on London in an attempt to confront the king and restore fairness to England, pointing to the principles of the Domesday Book. There are huge sections of The Uprising that are breathtakingly relentless, as you might expect. The frantic nature of the battle sequences is the medieval equivalent of Jason Bourne beating up an assailant with a book, albeit with hundreds of people doing it on a battlefield. There are also some truly stunning aerial shots of London and the Thames as the rebels travel to meet the king and his men in Blackheath, and this camerawork is repeated amidst frenetic sequences as all hell breaks loose in the capital after the king initially grants the wishes of the revolt.

There are times during The Uprising in which, once again, I found myself wishing that Greengrass was given the keys to direct every true life project greenlit for the screen. There is no one else who can put you front and centre of events in the way he does, and for that alone, The Uprising is worth seeing in the cinema. Ultimately, where it falls in the pantheon of his impressive oeuvre is another question. The Uprising is a flawed film, and not just because of its flagrant historical inaccuracies. After the final battle sequence, the film stretches itself too far, outstaying its welcome. Greengrass inserts a final scene that explains why the film was briefly marketed in the US as The Uprising: The Rise of Robin Hood, and it feels like a forced and completely unnecessary coda.

But even a lesser Greengrass film is still something to behold. From a personal point of view, I’d consider News of the World (2020) one of his more inconsequential works, and yet it’s still a fine piece of filmmaking. The Uprising falls into that category; it’s frequently impressive, pulling solid performances from its cast (Katherine Waterston’s excellent turn as the king’s mother and Tom Hollander’s slimy Stephen Dillane as part of the king’s counsel are further highlights) but can be loose enough that you bemoan the lack of depth to its characters.

There aren’t many people you’d follow into the muck and filth of 1381 England, but Greengrass is one of them. At times you’re reminded of the squalor of Monty Python and the Holy Grail (1975), but concomitantly the misery of Aleksei German’s How to be a God (2013). The farcical nature of the former is a comforting reminder that this was hundreds of years ago, yet the latter- a tale of a planet stuck in the dark ages- is a chilling reminder of the fiscal and political problems 2026 offers us. These two differing narratives mirror the positives and negatives of Greengrass’s latest feature, yet the importance of his filmmaking is something that feels like it's more relevant than ever. ★★★½  7.6/10