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Punishment Park

1971

Peter Watkins

Patrick Boland, Kent Foreman, Carmen Argenziano, Luke Johnson ...

7.1

959

Drama. Thriller "Punishment Park" is a pseudo-documentary purporting to be a film crews's news coverage of the team of soldiers escorting a group of hippies, draft dodgers, and anti-establishment types across the desert in a type of capture the flag game. The soldiers vow not to interfere with the rebels' progress and merely shepherd them along to their destination. At that point, having obtained their goal, they will be released. The film crew's ... [+]

	Author	Review
United Kingdom	Peter Bradshaw The Guardian	"Twenty-five years on, Peter Watkins's dystopian nightmare still grips (...) This is satire of the most intimately powerful sort (…) Rating: ★★★★ (out of 5)"	POS
United States	Jeremiah Kipp Slant	"This is an extreme, incendiary allegory stirring up deeper truths (…) Rating: ★★★★ (out of 4)"	POS
United Kingdom	William Thomas Empire	"Whilst this docudrama has dated badly and feels very contrived in places it is still an intriguing and provocative idea (…) Rating: ★★★ (out of 5)"	NEU
United States	Nathan Rabin AV Club	"The absolute conviction and rage Watkins and his untrained but passionate cast bring to the film make it difficult to dismiss or ignore."	POS
United States	Jonathan Rosenbaum Chicago Reader	"The results are both hysterical and unforgettable, as well as creepily up to date in certain respects."	POS
United States	J. Hoberman Village Voice	"'Punishment Park' can seem so outrageous as to verge on camp, but few other movies capture so painfully the rhetoric and desperation of the times."	POS

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