the audience applauded

Good concept, poorly executed.

Pretty good movie overall. First half was nothing special but it got better as it went along.

It's entirely possible that sending the audience out feeling lousy was intentional

Searching around for film related videos on Youtube,I found a clip of British reviewer Mark Kermode doing a review of the Nordic film Rams,where he mentioned a documentary called Addicted to Sheep as a companion piece.Discovering that the full 90 minute film was only on sale on the filmmakers website,I was pleased to discover that the BBC were going to show a trimmed down 60 minute cut,which led to me getting ready to start counting sheep.The outline of the doc:Filmed over 4 years,the movie follows the Hutchinson family on a North Pennines farm.With a least on the farm for 15 years,The Hutchinson face the hardship of the four seasons to rear the best sheep possible. View on the film:Avoiding any exposition (or sentimental) narration,director Magali Pettier uses brief waves of James Burrell's Ambient score to keep the rustic atmosphere of the film intact.Spending 4 years making the film,Pettier presents the sheep farming in a non-judgemental,matter of fact manner,with the children seeing a still born sheep as a part of farming.Showing the Hutchinson's take great pride in the care of their sheep,Pettier matches the beautifully dour North Pennines with family warmth,thanks to Pettier revealing the joys and hardships that the Hutchinson's face over the 4 seasons,as they become addicted to sheep.

It's a shame that the strapline for this touching little film - "One Family's Quest to Breed the Perfect Sheep" - is rather at odds with the film itself. "Addicted to Sheep" is a meandering, quiet, funny, touching, deeply fascinating look at a life lived in...well...the middle of nowhere. Although I was brought up in Dorset, I'm a townie at heart and the daily grind of this North Pennines family looks terrifyingly grim to me. But the family - especially the children - cope with it all amazingly well. There's a real love lived out in these bleak landscapes.The opening shot is hilarious, as the farmer catalogues a list of what's wrong with his sheep...but the pay-off at the end is the perfect counterpoint. In the meantime, there's plenty of sheep action, but no sign of a "quest" (this is just PR guff). Instead, we get birth, death, castration and plenty of mopping out of cow sheds. Thankfully there is no 'throughline' to this film - director Magali Pettier points her camera and captures what happens, and that is really what makes this such a charming exercise.There are off-hand mentions of money (or lack of it), of how the parents want to make sure their children are fed and clothed, but there's no whinging about government policies - this is an apolitical film. It is also entirely unsentimental, viz the stillborn lamb chucked casually into a bucket. The film might ultimately be "heartwarming", but that doesn't mean there are a few moments that can still shock.The family loves their farm, and their sheep, but it's always clear that the sheep are commodities. That's not a value judgement or a criticism, it's just a fact."Addicted to Sheep" has echoes of those classic b/w documentaries of the 1950s from Basil Wright or Lindsay Anderson. It even smacks of one of the more bleaker 1960s "Look at Life" featurettes (sans the Alan Wicker-style narration). I loved it.

The Oscars will be doled out in Hollywood this weekend, rewarding the best cinema releases of 2014, but it's a fair bet none of the judges will have seen a film like Addicted to Sheep.The feature-length documentary charting a year in the life of the Hutchinson family, hill farmers in Upper Teesdale, had its first cinema screening this week at the Gala in Durham with many who appear in the film seeing it for the first time.The film shows the beautiful sights and sounds of this upland landscape through the seasons while taking the viewer uncomfortably close to a lot of muck and slop – things the farmers live with every day.French director Magali Pettier, who grew up on a farm, originally planned to contrast English and French farming families. As she explained in Durham, "financial reasons and time" meant she had to revise her plans, focusing instead on the County Durham family recommended to her by Upper Teesdale Agricultural Support Services.You sense she recognised the Hutchinsons as cinema gold. In the end she spent four years with Tom, Kay and their three children, Jack, Esme and Hetty, who are now aged 13, 12 and 11 respectively. They are the stars of this film, a close and loving family whose daily routine would make most of us shiver.We see them up and out in all weathers and at the crack of dawn. We laugh as Hetty – a much younger Hetty – struggles to close barn doors and, as a tethered cow does what cows do, murmurs mournfully that she wishes they'd pick up their own mess.Look out for Addicted to Sheep. It could be one of the best films of 2015. To read the full review visit http://www.thejournal.co.uk/culture/film-news/review- documentary-feature-film-addicted-8684891#ICID=sharebar_email