Sightseers movie review & film summary (2012)

It's not immediately apparent that Chris is a killer. He just wants to show off his knowledge to Tina and have a nice holiday. The problem is, Chris can't let things go. Things like rudeness, boorish self-absorption, and being serenely happy grate on this resentful man. Tina, amazed by all the sex she is having, heady with freedom, tries to soothe him. 

At their first stop, the Crich Tramway Village, they ride old-fashioned double-deckers. Unfortunately, a big goon drops his candy wrapper on the floor, and Chris forces a confrontation, making everyone uncomfortable. Later, Chris sees an opportunity and takes it, backing over the unrepentant litterbug with his caravan, crushing him to death. Tina and Chris soap the blood off the tires and dump the body. Chris feels that litterbugs like this chap ruin everything, and, even worse, this particular squashed litterbug has now ruined the Tram Museum for him. And that, that he cannot forgive.

Chris has a motive behind his madness, in other words, which cracks open the deeper themes of the film. What does it mean to be an English person? Chris is quite proper in his attitudes. One should not litter. One should not flaunt one's good fortune. Those who refuse to play by those rules, well, they are a blot on the face of humanity and who will miss them anyway? The wild Midlands area is the site of ancient kingdoms, resonating with the memory of medieval greatness. It was also the engine of the Industrial Revolution. Part of the British ethos is politeness, a sort of "No, no, you first" attitude, and Chris is at war with himself: He is sick of coming in second. During one of the more gruesome killings, the incantatory words of British visionary William Blake, who wrote a lot about the downtrodden, echo from the screen: 

<i>And did those feet in ancient time

Walk upon England's mountains green?

And was the holy Lamb of God

On England's pleasant pastures seen?</i>

The British ideal is pastoral. Educated Victorian gentleman would take walking tours through the countryside, honing their observational skills of the natural world. Slobby Chris is the modern-day embodiment of that Victorian personality. But the connecting links are buried in the mists of time, leaving only incendiary class resentment. Chris bashes in the head of a snotty tourist in an isolated moor, and Tina whines, "I never thought about murdering an innocent person before." Chris replies, "He's not a person. He's a Daily Mail reader."