Film Review: "God's Own Country" (2017).

"A film by Francis Lee" comes God's Own Country. This British romantic drama film written and directed by Lee, in his feature directorial debut. A young farmer numbs his frustrations with drinking and casual sex until a Romanian migrant worker sets him on a new path.

Lee was inspired to write the film based on his own experiences of working on a farm and wanting to leave to attend drama school. However, it took Lee about six months to figure out the ins and outs of the plot before he committed to writing anything. When he did, he was able to complete the screenplay in just five days. To prepare for their roles as farmers, Lee made the two lead actors live and work in a farm for several weeks prior shooting the movie. Principal photography took place throughout Yorkshire, England and was shot in chronological order.

The film stars Josh O'Connor, Alec Secăreanu, Gemma Jones and Ian Hart. OConnor and Secăreanu gave Oscar-worthy takes on men who already seems in mourning for a loss they will be late to grasp.

The passion created here makes no restrictions on who can understand and appreciate it. This is as fine a love story as there is. It has crafted a film that flouts stereotypes and becomes one of the most sincere, most deeply felt love stories in years. What is remarkable about the film is how it doesn't politicise the homosexuality theme, transcends it to become the story of two people in doomed love. The two lead characters are wonderfully delineated. The real achievement of the film is not that it tells a universal love story that happens to have gay characters in it, but that it tells a distinctively gay story that happens to be so well told that any feeling person can be moved by it. An important and original romance that really and finally portrays the homosexual romance as two humans falling in love and never plays it for clichés. The film is ultimately about the paralysis of regret and how it fractures the lives of not just those afflicted by it, but everyone else around them. A masterful telling of star crossed love, with all the complications of any affair. Neither gratuitous nor shying away from the hidden passion, Lee crafts a sublte and quite beautiful film. A genuinely moving story about repressed desire that transcends any boundaries the various cultural warriors will want to impose on it. The film is simply telling a story of the heart, how unpredictable it can be and how empty life can be when individuals don't follow theirs. A haunting and complex story that explores the strength and fragility of love, Lee's visually magnificent film is as affecting as it is beautiful. The film is concerned with poignant storytelling and not once is this compromised by the glistening manlove. Lingered with me for days, though more for its noteworthy performances and breathtaking cinematography than for its divisive same-sex subject matter.

Simon says God's Own Country receives: