The Black Death and Economic Inequality

The film correctly identifies the Black Death as an important background to the rebellion. Beginning in 1348, the plague devastated England’s population, producing labour shortages that strengthened the bargaining position of surviving workers.

Landowners resisted these changes, while the Statute of Labourers of 1351 sought to restrict wages and reinforce labour regulations. By 1381, the resulting disagreements had contributed to decades of resentment.

However, medieval society was more complex than the film’s portrayal of impoverished peasants confronting uniformly wealthy oppressors. Some agricultural workers benefited from improved opportunities, while others remained bound by customary obligations. As Juliet Barker (2014) demonstrates, the rebellion attracted participants from diverse economic and social backgrounds.

Greengrass captures the underlying inequalities but exaggerates the uniformity of rural hardship.

The Poll Tax: An Authentic Cause

The film’s treatment of taxation is among its strongest historical elements. England’s prolonged war with France imposed considerable financial demands, prompting Parliament to authorise successive poll taxes in 1377, 1379 and 1380.

The final levy, collected in 1381, required a standard payment of twelve pence from individuals over fifteen, subject to arrangements for differing levels of wealth. Renewed collection efforts provoked resistance, particularly in Essex.

Yet the rebellion was never exclusively about taxation. Participants also challenged labour obligations, manorial privileges and abuses of local government. The film captures the immediate catalyst more successfully than the broader range of demands that emerged.

The Ploughman: An Invented Revolutionary

Andrew Garfield’s Ploughman is a fictional creation rather than a documented leader of the revolt. His personal tragedy provides an emotional route into the historical events, but his prominence introduces a familiar weakness of historical cinema: the transformation of collective action into the achievement of an exceptional individual.

This approach is particularly unfortunate given the remarkable organisation demonstrated by the actual rebels. Communities coordinated resistance, attacked administrative institutions and destroyed records that supported unpopular manorial obligations.

The Ploughman also recalls the literary figure of Piers in William Langland’s Piers Plowman. The parallel is suggestive, given the poem’s concern with labour and Christian morality, but it should not be mistaken for a historical connection.

Wat Tyler and John Ball

Unlike the Ploughman, Wat Tyler and John Ball were historical personalities. Tyler emerged as a leading figure among the Kentish rebels, although his earlier life remains obscure. The film is justified in portraying him as influential, but much of his dialogue and personal behaviour must necessarily be reconstructed.

John Ball offers an equally compelling character. His preaching challenged hereditary privilege through Christian arguments about humanity’s common origins, traditionally expressed in the question:

When Adam delved and Eve span, who was then the gentleman?

Ball’s criticism was radical within its medieval context, but he was not advocating modern secular democracy. His beliefs belonged to a Christian intellectual world in which questions of equality and justice were inseparable from religious teaching.

Greengrass recognises the political force of these ideas, although the film occasionally allows modern attitudes to shape the rebels’ aspirations.

Richard II and the Confrontation at Smithfield

Richard II was only fourteen during the Peasants’ Revolt of 1381. His government relied heavily on senior advisers, including Archbishop Simon Sudbury and Treasurer Robert Hales, both of whom the rebels killed during the uprising. Although the film portrays royal authority as largely resistant to reform, the historical Richard played a more active and complicated role.

On 14 June, Richard met the rebels at Mile End and agreed to substantial concessions, including the abolition of serfdom. Royal charters granting these freedoms were prepared, prompting many rebels to return home believing their demands had been accepted (Barker, 2014). The following day, Richard met Wat Tyler and other rebels at Smithfield, where an altercation ended with Tyler’s fatal wounding. London mayor William Walworth played a central role, although contemporary chroniclers differ over the precise circumstances.

The film transforms Smithfield into a deliberate royal ambush, but there is no convincing historical evidence that the meeting was a prearranged massacre. The more consequential betrayal came afterwards, when Richard’s government revoked the promised freedoms on 2 July and moved to suppress the remaining resistance.

In my view, the historical events are more revealing than the film’s dramatised confrontation. The rebels had compelled a young monarch to concede reforms that challenged established privileges, only to see those promises withdrawn once royal authority was restored. The political significance of that reversal hardly requires cinematic embellishment.

Robin Hood: History Gives Way to Legend

Perhaps the most questionable association surrounding The Uprising is Robin Hood. American promotional material briefly presented the film as an origin story, although the character is not explicitly identified as Robin Hood within the film.

The historical problem is straightforward. Robin Hood stories circulated before 1381, with a reference appearing in the late fourteenth-century B-text of Langland’s Piers Plowman, generally dated before the rebellion.

There is no credible evidence connecting the Peasants’ Revolt directly to the origins of the outlaw legend.

The comparison between popular resistance and outlaw mythology may work symbolically, but it is historically unsupported. I consider this association unnecessary, particularly when the actual rebellion offers such rich dramatic possibilities.

Production and Aesthetics: A Medieval World of Mud and Violence

Greengrass presents a visually unforgiving England of muddy roads, weathered clothing and oppressive buildings. His handheld camerawork brings immediacy to the disorder, although its constant movement can make the historical setting feel more like a modern conflict zone than a fourteenth-century society.

The distinction between poorly equipped rebels and armoured royal forces is broadly plausible, but medieval military equipment was more varied. Mail remained common alongside developing plate protection, while rebels might possess bows, spears, bills and other purpose-made weapons rather than relying exclusively upon agricultural tools.

The relentlessly grim appearance also deserves qualification. Medieval clothing could be colourful, churches richly decorated, and rural households relatively prosperous. Dirt and darkness are effective cinematic devices, but neither guarantees authenticity.

Modern English dialogue is understandable, although political expressions occasionally impose contemporary assumptions upon medieval characters.

Critical Reception and Historical Value

The film has received mixed reviews, with critics divided over its visual intensity and historical interpretation. On Rotten Tomatoes, it currently holds a 56% critics’ score and a 65% verified audience score.

Peter Bradshaw criticised its Robin Hood associations, while the Financial Times praised its energetic reconstruction of a neglected medieval rebellion. Such disagreement reflects the difficulty of balancing dramatic storytelling with historical interpretation. 

For history enthusiasts, the film’s principal achievement is its revival of interest in 1381. Its limitation is the tendency to portray a sophisticated popular movement primarily through personal suffering and heroic resistance.