God's Own Country

Director: Francis Lee
Screenwriters: Francis Lee

Institute History

  • 2017 Sundance Film Festival

Description

Directing Award: World Cinema Dramatic, Francis Lee

Spring. Yorkshire, England. Johnny Saxby, a 25-year-old sheep farmer, has sacrificed going away to college or getting a job in town to run the family farm for his ailing father, Martin (Ian Hart), and stoic grandmother Deirdre (Gemma Jones), numbing the daily frustration of his desolate life with binge drinking and casual sex. As lambing season approaches, Martin hires a Romanian migrant worker, Gheorghe, to assist the already exhausted Johnny.

Johnny bitterly resents Gheorghe, stubbornly insisting he can cope on his own, but Gheorghe proves he not only understands this farming life, but more importantly, he understands Johnny.


You can smell the mud in this movie. Every gritty, sensual detail springs from authenticity, especially the powerful emotional journey of its young leads played with fierce commitment by Josh O’Connor as Johnny and Alec Secareanu as Georghe. God’s Own Country marks the discovery of a major new talent in writer/director Francis Lee. This one is not to be missed.

— David Courier

Screening Details

Sundance Film Festival Awards

Credits

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