Avis des critiques

[I]t’s a melancholy whimsy about common purpose, new friendship and the persistence of the past, bogged down occasionally by a somewhat superfluous romantic subplot but buoyed up by Mike Eley’s lush cinematography, which beautifully captures the lonely beauty of the open English landscapes.

Mulligan was a replacement for original casting Nicole Kidman, but a fortuitous one: her sad, restrained and quietly witty character provides the emotional anchor for an undemanding but pleasantly cathartic drama.

The Dig is a movie steeped in the inevitable passage of time, but it’s also a reminder that the past lives on through the things we leave behind. And that’s as true of performances as it of ancient sword fittings forged from gold.

He [Stone] and screenwriter Moira Buffini... adopt an elliptical, glancing style that treats the present almost as if it were already a memory. Scenes weave in and out of each other, and are sometimes left unfinished. Conversations happen without anyone moving their mouths, the sounds of one intimate moment intruding on the images of another.

The trajectory of Preston’s plot allows them to emerge naturally and the performances do the rest. History with a British accent and a significant streak of repressed emotion inevitably attracts accusations of stuffiness but there is no cause for them here. It’s a poignant tale, gracefully told.

To its credit, this consistently interesting and at times engrossing picture declines to strike any of its notes with a hammer. Trading on the great British art of understatement, it’s scrupulous, sober, and tasteful throughout.

Director Simon Stone and cinematographer Mike Eley keep nudging things gently into Terrence Malick territory, letting the camera roam behind and beside people in fields, or employing a wider-than-usual lens to give things a pleasantly unsteady, slightly off feel... Several compositions involving natural light, lens flare, and negative space... are breathtaking.

Like the soon to be released Ammonite, The Dig is about a scientist from the wrong side of the track, who faces prejudice at every turn. Stone’s film never gets its hands dirty in the way that Francis Lee’s does. But it’s a whole lot rougher, and wryer, than Downton Abbey.

Sure, there’s enough lens flare to have you unconsciously reaching for your sunnies, but it’s a vicarious pleasure to let The Dig’s warm, gauzy light wash over you. Blanketed in defiant optimism and soaked in summer sun, it’s definitely one to watch with your nan.

Although it all may veer towards a cliched representation of British-ness, Fiennes and Mulligan’s leading turns as Brown and Pretty are charming.

Stone juggles all these plots and themes with prudence, but there is a nagging sense that the film should have played up the importance of the Sutton Hoo find more... Alas, "The Dig" is not a film for armchair archaeologists. It is more of a diversion for viewers looking for handsomely mounted period British melodrama.

Australian director Simon Stone’s (The Daughter) film delivers strong performances – from Ralph Fiennes and Carey Mulligan in particular – and top-level craft, but with an undercurrent of real emotion which sensitively conveys the fragility of lives and time. To use another of those abused words, it’s captivating.