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Movies / On DVD / Pierrepoint: The Last Hangman
Pierrepoint: The Last Hangman

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Pierrepoint: The Last Hangman (2007)

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Reviews Counted:50

Fresh:38

Rotten:12

Average Rating:7/10

Consensus: Director Adrian Shergold doesn't shy away from the darker elements of the movie's subject, and Timothy Spall is mesmerizing as the title character.

Rated: R [See Full Rating] for disturbing images, nudity and brief sexuality

Runtime: 90 mins

Genre: Dramas

Theatrical Release:Jun 1, 2007 Limited

Synopsis: Timothy Spall (Professor Pettigrew from the Harry Potter movies) gives a magnificently multilayered performance as the protagonist in PIERREPOINT: THE LAST HANGMAN. Spall plays Albert Pierrepoint,... Timothy Spall (Professor Pettigrew from the Harry Potter movies) gives a magnificently multilayered performance as the protagonist in PIERREPOINT: THE LAST HANGMAN. Spall plays Albert Pierrepoint, a grocery deliveryman who decides to apply for his father's old job--a hangman for the British courts. Soon he is perfecting the execution procedure, fulfilling his duties in record time and with no problems whatsoever. Though proud of his success, Pierrepoint prefers to keep it to himself, not even telling his wife, Anne (Juliet Stevenson), what he does when he leaves the house for days at a time. But when General Montgomery himself (Clive Francis) asks Pierrepoint to execute dozens of Nazis who have been sentenced to death, for the first time Pierrepoint starts questioning what he does, and soon his relatively calm, quiet world is turned upside down. Based on a true story, PIERREPOINT: THE LAST HANGMAN is a gripping period drama, bathed in grays by cinematographer Danny Cohen and production designer Candida Otton. Spall is mesmerizing as Pierrepoint, his slow walk and penetrating eyes filling the screen. Stevenson is excellent as his loyal wife, standing by him through thick and thin. PIERREPOINT is directed with careful precision by Adrian Shergold, a longtime actor and television director who trained at the feet of Mike Leigh, who has cast Spall in many of his own films. And Eddie Marsan excels as Tish, a compatriot of Pierrepoint's who lands himself in a very nasty bit of trouble. [More]

Starring: Timothy Spall, Juliet Stevenson, Eddie Marsan, James Corden

Starring: Timothy Spall, Juliet Stevenson, Eddie Marsan, James Corden, Christopher Fulford, Tobias Menzies, Tim Woodward

Director: Adrian Shergold

Director: Adrian Shergold
Screenwriter: Bob Mills, Jeff Pope
Producer: Christine Langan
Composer: Martin Phipps
Studio: IFC Films

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Release:

Oct 30, 2007

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Reviews for Pierrepoint: The Last Hangman

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Plodding biopic.

Full Review Source: Ozus' World Movie Reviews | comment Comment
07/17/09
Dennis Schwartz
Dennis Schwartz
Ozus' World Movie Reviews

The key to the film is in the performances by Spall and Stevenson -- and by Marsan. The utter averageness of the characters, their lack of insight, their normality, contrasts with the subject matter in an unsettling way.

Full Review Source: Chicago Sun-Times | comment Comment
11/02/07
Roger Ebert
Roger Ebert
Chicago Sun-Times
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

A suitably sombre treatment of a sombre story, Pierrepoint is nevertheless a riveting drama, sketching out not only the salient facts of Albert Pierrepoint's life but the turmoil in which that life caused in his soul

Full Review Source: Urban Cinefile | comment Comment
10/09/07
Urban Cinefile Critics
Urban Cinefile Critics
Urban Cinefile

Albert Pierrepoint single-handedly killed over 450 people in his career, dispatching most of them with an icy precision in less than 30 seconds.

Full Review Source: Monsters and Critics | comment Comment
09/07/07
Ron Wilkinson
Ron Wilkinson
Monsters and Critics

Spall is more than worthy of future leading roles.

Full Review Source: Film Threat | comment Comment
08/07/07
Matthew Sorrento
Matthew Sorrento
Film Threat

Overdramatizes Albert's 24-year career.

Full Review Source: Oregonian | comment Comment
07/13/07
Mike Russell
Mike Russell
Oregonian

Based on their press materials, they think they have made a film damning capital punishment and exploring Britain's most famous executioner. In fact, they haven't. But they have made a film of artistic beauty and endless fascination.

Full Review Source: culturevulture.net | comment Comment
07/10/07
Harry Chotiner
Harry Chotiner
culturevulture.net

Grim and disturbing yet perversely riveting.

Full Review Source: San Francisco Chronicle | comment Comment
06/22/07
Ruthe Stein
Ruthe Stein
San Francisco Chronicle
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

The movie grows more compelling in the latter half as British public opinion turns against capital punishment and Pierrepoint begins to have his own doubts.

Full Review Source: Chicago Reader | comment Comment
06/21/07
J. R. Jones
J. R. Jones
Chicago Reader
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

There is a great deal of food for thought in a film that personalizes the effects of the death penalty on both the executed and the executioner.

Full Review Source: Reeling Reviews | comment Comment
06/19/07
Robin Clifford
Robin Clifford
Reeling Reviews

A genuine and skillful account of one of Britain's most morally ambiguous working-class characters.

Full Review Source: Sympatico.ca | comment Comment
06/18/07
Angela Baldassarre
Angela Baldassarre
Sympatico.ca

...a powerful pairing of work by two terrific actors [Spall and Stevenson].

Full Review Source: rec.arts.movies.reviews | comment Comment
06/16/07
Laura Clifford
Laura Clifford
rec.arts.movies.reviews

The very title of this movie seems to message its doom. What could possibly be dramatic enough about Britain's last hangman to carry our interest over a 90-minute film? A whole lot, it turns out.

Full Review Source: Toronto Star | comment Comment
06/15/07
Susan Walker
Susan Walker
Toronto Star
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

A completely engaging film. It's all about performance, and Timothy Spall is riveting as the earnest hangman. If you're desperate for a movie that has nothing to do with sequels or product placement, look no further.

Full Review Source: Jam! Movies | comment Comment
06/15/07
Liz Braun
Liz Braun
Jam! Movies

[The film's] grittiness instantly adds to the historically and socio-economically convincing picture of working-class Yorkshire in the last century.

Full Review Source: Globe and Mail | comment Comment
06/15/07
Liam Lacey
Liam Lacey
Globe and Mail
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

Very much a bookend to Vera Drake in its mixture of post war British reserve and ugly reality. [Actor] Spall makes it work, creating a little man with big and terrible secrets.

Full Review Source: Boston Globe | comment Comment
06/15/07
Ty Burr
Ty Burr
Boston Globe
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

Somewhere in this true story lies a grand statement about what taking lives for a living really does to a person’s moral compass. [Director] Adrian Shergold never quite finds it; his film dutifully recounts the facts but only skims the surface.

Full Review Source: Time Out New York | comment Comment
06/09/07
David Fear
David Fear
Time Out New York

The shot angles, the gray look of the film as a whole and Timothy Spall’s spectacular and understated performance as Pierrepoint make this one of the most powerful anti-capital punishment films I’ve seen.

Full Review Source: San Diego Metropolitan | comment Comment
06/09/07
Jean Lowerison
Jean Lowerison
San Diego Metropolitan

Handsomely crafted and well-acted, but its sense of scale is as constricted as a noose.

Full Review Source: AV Club | comment Comment
06/09/07
Noel Murray
Noel Murray
AV Club

It's Timothy Spall who really carries the film.

Full Review Source: Newark Star-Ledger | comment Comment
06/08/07
Stephen Whitty
Stephen Whitty
Newark Star-Ledger
Top Critic Icon Top Critic
 
 
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