People are voting emotionally.

The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.

Blistering performances.

The film may be flawed, but its message is not.

Lush orchestral strings swing wide over moody panorama; and then in small we go, into the solitary Hide – or glorified shed – on the Fenland Marches where Roy Tunt is, laying out fastidiously, his paste sandwiches, binoculars, his twitcher credentials: "It's all go in here" he says to himself self-mockingly.He's gonna be an odd-bod is Roy Tunt; replete with mild-mannered, typical, quirky, English eccentricity; he'll amuse us for a while; and bemuse – or baffle – the dark taciturn northern stranger Dave who stumbles into his seemingly benign, nerdish birdy world: "I'll let you get on with your twatting" says Northern tyke Dave swigging back his bottle of hard stuff. Roy Tunt is not amused. He rebuffs the slight with snobby aplomb. He's posh see. Or at least more highly educated than "Drum & Bass raver Dave. Knows his who's from his whoms does Roy.The dialogue between the 2 is spun beguilingly – in terse, Pinteresque pauses and platitudes; all sorts of murky things being twitched and twatted at. Dave keeps having gory flashback visions to crows feasting on flesh – designed to make you think he's been up to something a bit nasty and bloody.When the switch came i was half expecting it but still unnerved. Especially at what Roy Tunt had been putting in those paste sandwiches (which Dave was hungrily gobbling up) The shocking shift into violence at the end seemed clamped on to add gory reward for the watching and waiting we've been patiently doing: ear chewing and brains being splattered kicked us into another genre of movie entirely. "Rather unseemly and unnecessary if you ask me" would have been a Roy Tunts cursory verdict with his bird-watcher hat on. Minus the sticks of dynamite under his cardigan vest.Alex McQueen did the whole posh twitchy twit thing off to a tee. I'd watch the film to watch him watching his birds.

Sorry to disagree with Mr Hitchcock, but this film gets twitchers spot on: like him I am a birdwatcher, and I have lost count of the number of them who, like Roy Tunt, claim 'I am not a twitcher: I am an ornithologist'. Just spend a day in a hide on the Somerset levels and you will see what I mean. Of course there are inaccuracies in the film - for example, no serious birdwatcher would go to the location where the film is set without a telescope, but that is beside the point: the film is about an obsessional man, and birdwatchers are a pretty obsessional bunch. Several years ago I was in a hide on the levels on a very cold Boxing Day afternoon: an elderly couple came in and during the course of a lively conversation informed us that a well known local birder had spent the whole of the previous day in the hide - despite have two children under the age of five. One can imagine Mr Tunt doing the same. To get back to the film, after the showing at the Bath Film Festival one of the producers did a Q&A, much of which revolved around why it can't get distribution: incredible really, especially when compared to a film like Cold Souls, also at the festival, which has a negligible plot. The film was apparently shot in 11 days, 5 days on location, 6 at Pinetree: the hide was bought for £100 from a Lincolnshire farmer, who couldn't believe his luck ! If anyone is wondering why the actor who plays David hasn't done any work for a few years, tragically his brother was murdered 4 years ago. No-one will be surprised to hear that a huge amount of effort went into the lighting, which perfectly captures the progress of a dank day from dawn to dusk. See it if you can, this is a gem.

I was not sure what to expect but I really enjoyed it, and it kept my attention throughout, despite the late hour. The writing was excellent, both actors were terrific and the film was beautifully shot. The film is full of tension without descending into cheap shocks. I would say it is less 'Pinteresque' (as one reviewer said) than Sam Shepherdesque... as you carry on thinking about the characters and the things you learn about them long after the film is over. The scenes of the lonely marshland and the distant birds are very atmospheric, too. I hope it gets the success it deserves! It's great to see a British film, and I presume a low-budget one, with such promise.

I just watched this movie on Film4's British connection season and was surprised at how little recognition this film has received. The message board is bare, only 12 votes and no comments have been made so far, so I thought I'd make a deserved contribution.I'll be honest: I was expecting something fairly mediocre and cheap-looking but I was very pleasantly surprised. It didn't look cheap at all with great cinematography of the Suffolk countryside and the general colour and tone of the film was perfect and felt really authentic.Both actors do very well - especially considering the whole cast consists of just them. Phil Campbell's performance was occasionally quite wooden and unnecessarily clichéd as the 'mysterious dark stranger' character; but "occasionally" is a key word there, as he - with MacQueen - really shines toward the end. I was impressed with Alex MacQueen, especially as I've only ever seen him in very minor roles in various sitcoms such as "The Inbetweeners", but his character is complex and brilliantly pulled off.The film starts off well and captivatingly with great dialogue in the interaction between the two leads, with mystery and suspense surrounding the two as 'Roy Tunt' is clearly intimidated somewhat by Dave. Unfortunately, the film then becomes rather slow until the last half an hour or so - and the clips of the crows feasting on flesh become tedious after a while. But "The Hide" climaxes with a surprising twist and a great dénouement revealing why both characters find themselves in this remote mudflat. The very final scene is a particular favourite of mine, ending on a sharply shocking note.Overall, it's a decent little film, which is slow in parts but ultimately rewarding. A solid debut from Marek Losey.7.5/10