Film

Monkey Man

07/04/24

Cineworld, Edinburgh

Dev Patel’s debut film as a director is an ultra-violent revenge thriller set in an Indian city called Yatana that looks very much like Mumbai. Patel plays Kid, a man entirely motivated by the need to find the corrupt Police Chief, Rana (Sikandar Kher), who is responsible for the brutal murder of Kid’s mother back when he actually was a, well, kid. Why it’s taken him so long to get around to this is never explained.

Kid currently earns a buck by taking part in a series of no-holds-barred fights, hosted by sleazy MC, Tiger (Sharlto Copley), and attended by baying crowds. He hides his identity behind a realistic monkey mask – inspired by the Indian god, Hanuman – but he doesn’t win his bouts, preferring instead to make easy money by taking dives. Meanwhile, he finds a way of procuring work as a barman at the swish city nightclub where he knows Rana likes to spend his spare time. His sole ambition is to get to Rana and kill him.

While Monkey Man has a distinctive look (largely thanks to cinematographer Sharon Weir) and occasionally hints at the more interesting film it could have been, it feels hampered by its reductive plot and an evident desire to be a kind of Asian John Wick. Those films are actually mentioned by one character early on and, in the final extended punch-up, where Kid fights his way from the basement of the hotel to the VIP room at the top, it’s hard not to think of Gareth Evans’ The Raid – though these films feel almost restrained compared to the levels of bone-snapping, blood-drenched violence on offer here. That 18 certificate is there for a reason.

Patel’s character dominates the film to the extent that none of the other actors gets much of a look in. An early attempt to introduce perky sidekick, Alphonso (Pitobash), is disappointingly abandoned, and Kid’s brief interplay with a sympathetic sex worker, Sita (Sobita Dhulipala), is never allowed to develop into anything more substantial.

Occasionally Patel – who co-wrote the screenplay with Paul Angunawela and John Collee – tries to usher in more original elements. There are references to Indian folklore, pastoral flashbacks to Kid’s rural childhood and there are some astute observations about bogus spiritual leaders, who exploit the poverty of their followers, but these themes are repeatedly punched and kicked into submission by a seemingly endless succession of extended fight scenes. The first one, set largely in a kitchen (with a varied supply of potential weapons), is brilliantly choreographed and has me flinching and gasping in all the right places. But it’s followed by another fight and then another one and the repetitiveness of them begins to work against the material.

Eventually, I start to feel bludgeoned and bored, which I’m pretty sure is not the effect Patel was looking for.

In the chaos of flying fists and breaking bones, I also find myself asking questions. If Kid simply wants revenge on a single man, why not wait until he’s alone, rather than surrounded by hundreds of bodyguards? What’s the point is maiming all those people who are simply carrying out their duties? (Mind you, I’d be the first to admit that wouldn’t make for a particularly memorable film, either.)

Action junkies will doubtless tell me that I’m wrong about Monkey Man, that it’s a kick-ass, adrenalin-fuelled marvel, but the occasional flashes of brilliance it does contain merely enforce my view that this film could so easily have been an absolute knockout, instead of the long and messy brawl that it is.

3 stars

Philip Caveney

The Trouble with Jessica

06/04/24

Cameo Cinema, Edinburgh

The Trouble With Jessica is at the Cameo tonight, and so are director Matt Winn and lead actor Shirley Henderson, here for a Q&A. The place is bustling. Indeed, the only seats we can find are in the very front row, but that’s okay. We settle down in the comfy velvet chairs and stretch our legs out, making the most of the space.

TTWJ is essentially a comedy of manners, drawing on elements of farce. It goes to some dark places – including suicide, depression and rape – but always (trust me) with humour, eliciting belly laughs from tonight’s audience. Winn treads that precarious line well.

Sarah (Henderson) and Tom (Alan Tudyk) have invited their best friends over for what Sarah dramatically announces will be the last dinner party they’ll host in this house. Tom’s latest architectural project has flopped, and they need to sell their beloved home to save themselves from going under. But Beth (Olivia Williams) and Richard (Rufus Sewell) have brought along an extra guest, a mutual ‘friend’ called Jessica (Indira Varma), whose recent memoir has become a bestseller. Sarah is not pleased. She’s no fan of Jessica’s and, as soon as the titular character begins to speak, it’s easy to see why. She’s awful.

And then she kills herself in Sarah and Tom’s garden.

Sarah is furious. The house sale might be jeopardised! Her kids might have to go to state schools! They might have to live in a rubbish part of London! There’s nothing for it. They’ll have to move the body, pretend the suicide occurred elsewhere…

Through all the deliciously heightened nonsense that follows, the only thing I find hard to believe is that Sarah and Beth would keep up their friendship with Jessica. She doesn’t seem to have any redeeming features. She’s slept with two of Beth’s boyfriends and flirts incessantly with Tom. She’s rude and demanding and I don’t know anyone who’d put up with her.

That aside, I enjoy this film.

There is a charming cameo from Anne Reid as a nosey neighbour, and a wonderfully sinister series of scenes with Sylvester Groth as the potential house buyer. Jonathan Livingstone and David Schaal are very funny as PCs Terry and Paul, working-class foils to all the hoity-toity hogwash (although PC Paul recognises a decent clafoutis when he sees one).

It’s a stylish movie. The camera often lingers on the loveliness of the house, like an estate agent’s puff piece, reminding us of what’s at stake. Yes, Sarah and Tom are very privileged and it’s easy to mock their first world problems – but no one wants to lose what they have accrued; no one wants to fail, to have to step backwards. Of course they’d probably be fine if it all went tits up – but it’s no surprise they don’t want to put that theory to the test. It’s more relatable than its milieu might make it sound.

I like the title cards that act as introductions to the various ‘chapters’, each beginning The Trouble With… Tension mounts as the quartet struggle to come to terms with what they’re doing, as well as to manage the practicalities. Henderson in particular is riveting, her brittle capriciousness a delight to watch.

The Q&A is interesting too; it’s good to find out a little more about the process – especially Winn’s composition of the score – and it’s always a thrill to be in the same room as the people you’ve just been watching on the screen.

Once home, I find myself googling clafoutis recipes. Guess what we’re having for pudding tonight?

4 stars

Susan Singfield

Scoop

06/04/24

Netflix

What is the purpose of dramatising recent news events unless it’s to shine a different light on them? Scoop, directed by Philip Martin, doesn’t do that. Instead, it’s a pretty straightforward retelling of something we can all remember: Prince Andrew’s 2018 car-crash interview on BBC’s Newsnight.

Although it’s very watchable, the only fresh thing we’re actually offered here is a little look at some behind-the-scenes admin, and – frankly – that’s not enough. Based on Samantha McAlister’s memoir, her role as the ‘booker’ is almost laughably prominent. I’m sure she was very good at her job, but I don’t really care. “Person does the work they’re paid to do” isn’t much of a revelation. Nobody’s watching this because they’re interested in a “brilliant” TV producer. Self-aggrandising Sam (Billie Piper) gets the bus to work, eats kebabs and relies on her mum for childcare. Am I supposed to take something away from this?

We don’t get any original insights into Prince Andrew’s involvement with Jeffrey Epstein; we don’t learn anything new about his sexual exploitation of trafficked women. (I’m not calling him a paedophile because that’s not what he is. ‘Sexual predator’ and ‘rapist’ are the correct words. Abuse of women is bad enough; we don’t have to call it something else.) We don’t glimpse his reaction to the fall-out. We do see how attached he is to his teddy bears, which is amusing but hardly illuminating. The only vaguely unexplored territory covered is the impact on Prince Andrew’s aide, Amanda Thirsk (Keeley Hawes), who is portrayed here as a naïve and trusting woman, believing both Andrew’s assertions of innocence and McAlister’s assurances that this interview will be good for him. A brief moment with Andrew’s daughter, Beatrice (Charity Wakefield), also offers a little much-needed emotion, her lip quivering as she counters her father’s dismissal of Twitter (“I don’t look at that”) with a muted, sad-eyed, “I do.”

Rufus Sewell’s and Gillian Anderson’s impersonations of the key players are spot-on, although credit for that must be shared by the costume and make-up designers (Matthew Price and Kirstin Chalmers). The likenesses are uncanny. I just don’t know what they’re for.

I can’t help feeling that this is a pointless exercise. The actual interview – in all its startling horror – is available for anyone to see, so why bother watching a facsimile of it?

2.8 stars

Susan Singfield

Godzilla X Kong: The New Empire

03/05/24

Cineworld, Edinburgh

I am in the unusual position of having seen a Godzilla film recently and in the even more unusual position of having actually enjoyed it (Godzilla Minus One, thanks for asking). Today I am at something of a loose end, so I think, why not check out Godzilla X Kong: The New Empire? After all, it’s just opened to impressive box office returns and hey, how bad can it be? The answer to that question is ‘very bad indeed’ and I seriously doubt that anybody who has shelled out to see this incomprehensible twaddle has left the screening thinking, ‘well, that was entertaining.’

Kong is currently living in Hollow Earth, where life seems to consist of fighting the various weird creatures that live down there and occasionally eating them. He’s also suffering from a very bad toothache. His antics are being closely monitored by Scientist Dr Ilene Andrews (Rebecca Hall, looking vaguely embarrassed and doubtless wistfully thinking about the serious acting career she previously enjoyed). Meanwhile, Godzilla is up on the planet’s surface, occasionally letting off steam by wrecking whichever city happens to get in his way and taking the occasional nap in the Coliseum in Rome. For some inexplicable reason, the earth’s inhabitants seem to approve of him, despite the fact that he must be inadvertently killing hundreds of them every time he knocks down a block of flats. Go figure.

Andrews enlists a veterinarian, Trapper (Dan Stevens), to take care of Kong’s bad tooth and a podcaster, Bernie Hayes (Brian Tyree Henry), for no apparent reason other than to occupy the position of comic relief, while she wanders from location to location in true Basil Exposition style, explaining what’s going on. As the plot is needlessly complicated, these skills are in demand. Inexplicable happenings include her adopted daughter, Jia (Kaylee Hottle), the only surviving member of a Hollow Earth tribe, picking up what appear to be distress signals from deep underground; the presence of an (admittedly cute) baby Kong; and a tribe of giant apes in the underworld who are being ruled by a cruel dictator called The Scar King. In one scene, Dr Andrews looks at some carvings on a wall and is able to extrapolate an entire story from them in a matter of moments. Ah, the benefits of an education!

None of this makes any sense but it doesn’t actually matter, because what the film mostly boils down to is a series of extended ape vs reptile punch-ups that go on for just about forever. Weta studios have produced some brilliant CGI creations here, there’s no doubt about that, but if any member of their team has ever heard the adage that ‘less is more,’ there’s no evidence of it. The fight sequences (and there are a lot of them) are interminable, the screen filled with roaring, bellowing close ups of either Mr Kong or Mr Godzilla (though it should be said that the latter has much less to do than his simian adversary). Sometimes they fight each other, other times they fight as a kind of tag team as they take on Scar King and his followers. If roaring and bellowing is your go-to, then this could just be the perfect film for you. If not, then maybe give it a swerve. I wish I had.

I can’t stop thinking that this truly dreadful farrago must have cost millions of dollars to produce and that half a dozen low-budget films – with credible storylines – could have been produced in its place. For my money, Godzilla X Kong is just an empty exercise, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.

1.5 stars

Philip Caveney

Mothers’ Instinct

30/03/24

Cineworld, Edinburgh

Benoît Delhomme’s directorial debut looks beautiful: every scene is a pastel-perfect work of art. Stepford-ish wives Celine (Anne Hathaway) and Alice (Jessica Chastain) are next-door neighbours, with identikit McMansions, impeccable wardrobes and lookalike husbands. Even their sons, Max (Baylen D. Bielitz) and Theo (Eamon Patrick O’Connell), are a matching pair: they’re best friends, just like their moms. But not everything in this 1960s paradise is as peachy as it seems, and Max’s sudden death exposes more than just grief…

Mothers’ Instinct works well in many ways: Hathaway and Chastain deliver performances as flawless as their characters’ powder-pink co-ords. Celine’s brittle devastation and Alice’s mounting unease are slowly revealed, leading us first one way and then another, as we’re not sure whose version of reality to believe. The tension crackles and there’s some fine melodrama at play here.

Sadly – and don’t read any further if you’re worried about spoilers – there’s also an embarrassingly regressive subtext: women without children are monstrous. A generous reading might be that this is what happens to women when motherhood is the only role they’re allowed (Alice, keen at the start of the film to return to her work as a journalist, is told by her husband to contribute something to her son’s school newsletter). But, as the film progresses, it feels more like an indictment of childless women: driven mad by the frustration of their most basic desire, they are dangerous and should be feared.

It’s 2024. I honestly thought this was going to go somewhere different, that it would tease us with the clichés and then pull the rug from under us. But no. This actually is the grieving-mother-turns-psycho insult that is suggested from the start.

In the face of this deep-rooted misogyny, it seems pointless to quibble about minor plot details, such as why the police wouldn’t suspect foul play when so many deaths occur in one small neighbourhood, or how a woman can walk on a lawn in stilettos without getting mud on her heels or crawl through a hedge without mussing up her hair.

Mother’s Instinct has a lot in common with its lead character: it’s beautifully put together, but fundamentally fucked up.

2.7 stars

Susan Singfield

Late Night with the Devil

29/03/24

Cineworld, Edinburgh

The majority of horror movies have recently settled into a predictable format – an unfolding sequence of jump-scares and body shocks with an open-ended conclusion that allows for the inevitable sequel. Late Night with the Devil comes as a reinvigorating breath of foul air to the genre. Written and directed by Australian brothers Cameron and Colin Cairnes (though the setting couldn’t be more convincingly American), the film is entirely set in a TV studio, a recording of a 1977 Halloween special, hosted by struggling chat show star, Jack Delroy (David Dastmalchian).

We’re first given a verité-style catch up on the man’s career: his slow steady rise to fame in the 60s, when he briefly challenged Johnny Carson for the top spot, and the rumours that his success is due to his membership of a mysterious cabal of wealthy entertainers and businessmen. But more recently his ratings have begun to slump, culminating in an awkward appearance by his wife, Madeline, on the show just weeks before her death from lung cancer. Subsequently, Delroy has been off screen for quite some time but now he’s back – and it quickly becomes clear that there’s a lot riding on tonight’s appearance.

And then we’re told that was his final show.

Delroy’s guests are revealed one by one. There’s ‘psychic’ Christou (Faysal Bazzi), who offers the usual ‘I’m getting a message from somebody beginning with D’ patter. There’s James Randi-style sceptic Carmichael (Ian Bliss), currently offering half a million dollars to anyone who can offer convincing proof of the supernatural. And there are the headliners, parapsychologist June (Laura Gordon) and her teenage ward, Lilly (Ingrid Torelli), whose jaunty, ultra-polite confidence is unsettling to say the very least. June believes that Lilly is possessed by a demon and has recently published a book about her conversations with the creature within. Pushing for more viewers, Delroy suggests that June might like to invite the demon into the studio for an interview. What could possibly go wrong?

The show is interspersed with commercial breaks, where a handheld camera follows Delroy around the building, filming his off-screen conversations with his producer (this is perhaps the one element that doesn’t entirely convince; who is filming these sequences and why?) but, suffice to say, as the evening proceeds, things begin to go wrong, initially in small ways but growing ever more disruptive, ever more sinister.

Dastmalchian captures his character perfectly, allowing us glimpses of the paranoia that lurks behind that smooth, unruffled exterior. I also like Rhys Auteri’s performance as his ever-smiling co-presenter, Gus, who clearly doesn’t relish the new direction in which the show is heading, but has to keep supplying the deadpan jokes until the bitter end, even when he’s provoked into interacting with the thing he hates most. Late Night with the Devil is also occasionally very funny, which is something of an unexpected bonus. The nuances of an American chat show are effectively captured – the eye rolls, the in-jokes, the relentless cheerfulness in the face of adversity. In places I find myself laughing out loud at the sheer audacity of it all and then, just as suddenly, I’m not laughing any more.

In its final stretches, the film hurtles headlong into bone-wrenching, head-exploding madness and I have no option but to strap in and go with it. It’s been quite a while since I have so thoroughly enjoyed a horror film and I look forward to whatever the Cairnes brothers have hidden up their respective sleeves for their next offering. Meanwhile, Late Night with the Devil serves as a perfect introduction to their evident skills.

4.8 stars

Philip Caveney

Road House

28/03/24

Amazon Prime

I’ve been a fan of director Doug Liman’s work since watching Go, way back in 1999 – and I’ve rated Jake Gyllenhaal since Donnie Darko in 2001. So when I hear that the two of them are teaming up to create a new version of Road House, a cheesy Patrick Swayze fight flick from 1989, my interest is immediately piqued. Why would anyone bother? Then I hear that Liman has officially disowned the film, because Amazon Studios promised him a theatrical release for it and reneged on the deal. Gyllenhaal, on the other hand, claims he was always told it would go straight to streaming.

Go figure.

Gyllenhaal (who has clearly been putting in some serious time down at the gym) plays Elwood Dalton, a former UFC middleweight fighter, now in disgrace after “something bad” happened. When we first meet him, he’s at a scuzzy ‘no holds barred’ event, where a local tough guy is taking on all comers. But one look at Dalton stepping into the ring and he’s off, leaving the disgraced celebrity to take the winnings. On the way out of the club, Dalton is stabbed, something he appears to take in his stride – and then he’s approached by Frankie (Jessica Williams), who owns a nightclub out in the Florida Keys and is looking for a new bouncer. It seems that the titular establishment has been attracting the wrong kind of clientele and punch-ups are now a nightly occurrence.

Dalton reluctantly turns up for the gig, only to discover that – for safety reasons – the bands perform in a chicken wire cage and the staff are of a distinctly nervous disposition. Rough stuff promptly ensues…

This version of Road House is a sizeable step up from its progenitor. It helps that Gyllenhall’s Dalton is a softly spoken, helpful sort of guy, who gives his opponents every opportunity to walk away before, as a last resort, dealing with them, quickly, effectively and with minimum fuss. There’s some chirpy dialogue and some dryly funny observations as the carnage ensues. Along the way, Dalton enjoys a brief romance with the local Police Chief’s daughter, Ellie (Daniela Melchior), and even finds time to establish a quirky friendship with Charlie (Hannah Love Lanier), a teenage girl attempting to run the local book store with her father, Stephen (Kevin Carroll).

The plot thickens when it turns out that all that violence at the club is being orchestrated by local business kingpin, Ben Brandt (Billy Magnussen), who – in turn – calls out his father’s preferred honcho, Knox (Connor McGregor in his debut screen role), to back him up. McGregor may not be Laurence Olivier, but he attacks his role with such evident glee that, despite his character’s repulsive qualities, he somehow manages to win me over, if only at the prospect of seeing him get his comeuppence.

Road House starts and finishes explosively and if, like an aging boxer, it gets a little bit flabby around the middle, well it’s certainly a big improvement on the original and a fun way to spend a couple of hours.

3.8 stars

Philip Caveney

Monster

17/03/24

Cineworld, Edinburgh

After his Korean-set story Broker, director Kore-Eda Hirokazu returns to his Japanese homeland for Monster, working alongside screenwriter, Yûji Sakamoto. The result won the Best Screenplay award at the Cannes film festival and it’s easy to see what entranced the judges. This masterful Rashomon-style story offers us the same set of circumstances from three different perspectives and, as each successive layer is revealed, our perceptions are radically changed and confounded.

The story is set in an unnamed Japanese suburb and begins with a devastating fire at a local hostess bar. Rumours fly about who might have been there at the time, and suspicion falls on Hori (Eita Nagayama), a young teacher at the local primary school. Single mother Saori (Sakura Mugino) becomes increasingly concerned by some of the things that her young son, Minato (Sōya Kurokawa), says to her and she develops the suspicion that Hori may be bullying him. But when she makes enquiries, she is met with an ultra-polite wall of apologies from Yori’s fellow teachers, headed up by the school’s inscrutable principal (Yūko Tanaka). And what is Saori to make of Yori’s claim that Minato has himself been bullying fellow pupil, Hoshikawa (Hinata Hiragi)?

As the plot unravels, a question arises: who exactly is the titular monster of the tale?

But in this story, appearances can be deceptive. As soon as I settle upon one explanation, I am obliged to drastically rethink it – and it would be criminal to reveal anything more about this sly, gently paced and decidedly labyrinthine film. Suffice to say that, as it it moves sure-footedly towards a thought-provoking, open-ended conclusion, it generates a powerful grip.

There are wonderful performances here, particularly from the young leads, who perfectly embody the awful uncertainty of pre-adolescence – and from Mugino, whose baffled incredulity is palpable as she struggles through the hoops and hurdles of bureaucracy. There’s also a gentle, melancholy soundtrack courtesy of the legendary Ryuichi Sakamoto – sadly his last.

Monster is an accomplished film and Kore-Eda clearly a director at the top of his game.

4.6 stars

Philip Caveney

Drive-Away Dolls

16/03/24

Cineworld, Edinburgh

Since their auspicious debut with Blood Simple way back in 1984 (when I had the honour of interviewing them for Manchester’s City Life magazine), Joel and Ethan Coen have unleashed a whole barrage of brilliant films. OK, so there have been one or two misfires in there, but few filmmakers have been so consistently prolific and on the button.

A few years ago they decided to take a sabbatical and work on their own individual projects. Older brother Joel landed first with The Tragedy of Macbeth, which – despite having possibly the most self-aggrandising screen credit in history – turned out to be one of the finest Shakespeare movie adaptations ever. Now it’s Ethan’s turn and Drive-Away Dolls, co-written with his wife, Tricia Cooke, is the result. The central story is so sniggeringly phallus-obsessed it might just as easily have been written by Beavis and Butthead.

The ‘dolls’ in question are Marian (Geraldine Viswanathan) and Jamie (Margaret Qualley), two lesbian besties. Marian is reserved and socially awkward. She spends most of her spare time reading highbrow literature. Jamie is her polar opposite, with a propensity for raucous and ill-fated relationships. She’s in the process of messily breaking up with policewoman, Sukie (Beanie Feldstein), and urgently needs a change of scenery, so she talks Marian into taking her on a road trip to Tallahassee.

The women hire a drive-away vehicle from Curlie (Bill Camp) and set off on the long drive, blissfully unaware that they have got their wires badly crossed and that the boot of their car contains a metal attaché case containing something of great value. (This device feels so like the MacGuffin in Pulp Fiction, it surely has to be intentional.)

At any rate, Marion and Jamie are being pursued by a trio of bad guys, led by ‘The Chief’ (a criminally underused Colman Domingo), who want what’s in that briefcase. Rough stuff inevitably ensues…

While Drive-Away Dolls feels closer to familiar Coen territory than Shakespeare ever could, it’s exasperating to witness how consistently this fails to hit any of its chosen targets. Viswanathan and Qually are both engaging performers, but Qually in particular is stuck with the unenviable task of delivering slabs of frankly unbelievable dialogue, the kind of lines that no human character would ever utter. Furthermore, the women’s lesbianism is viewed purely through the male gaze: they are incongruously penis-fixated and the camera lingers on their bodies in a salacious fashion, which makes the whole thing feel dated as well as puerile. The villains are so inept that they fail to generate any sense of menace and, meanwhile, a string of A listers, including Matt Damon and Pedro Pascal (who presumably signed up for this on the understanding that it had the name ‘Coen’ attached), are reduced to cameo roles that give them little to do except die.

There are a few funny lines. A couple of weird psychedelic sequences, which seem to have drifted in from an entirely different movie, occasionally attempt to shift this ailing vehicle into a higher gear, but Drive-Away Dolls is a resounding failure that feels hopelessly stuck in first.

The news that the Coens are back together and already working on their next project can only come as a welcome relief.

2.5 stars

Philip Caveney

Lisa Frankenstein

07/03/23

Cineworld, Edinburgh

Diablo Cody first came to my attention with Juno (2007), a whip-smart, whimsical piece of work that deservedly won her the Oscar for Best Original Screenplay. Two years later, her script for Jennifer’s Body, though divisive, was still an impressive piece of work. Since then, her career has been somewhat hit and miss, but her name is still the main reason I choose to see Lisa Frankenstein. 

So I’m somewhat nonplussed to discover that the film is a dud. Seriously, the word ‘disappointing’ does not cover how bad this is – a slice of horror comedy that isn’t particularly gruesome (given the PG13 certificate) and manages to be about as funny as a car crash. The kindest thing I can think to say about it is that it has stylish opening titles that promise something much more sophisticated than what follows.

Lisa Swallows (Kathryn Newton) has never quite got over the night when her mother was murdered by a random axe murderer. (Laughing yet?) She now lives with her Dad, Dale (Joe Chrest), who is now married to Janet (Carla Gugino, chewing the scenery as the traditional evil stepmother, yet arguably the most watchable element in the film).  Lisa has also acquired a step-sister, Taffy (Liza Soberano), who – against all the odds – is friendly and supportive, which may be the only touch of originality here.

Lisa has taken to spending her spare time in the local cemetery, where she has been brooding beside the grave of a young Victorian male, who died back in 1837. Cue a thunderstorm, a convenient flash of lighting and said creature (played by Cole Sprouse) reanimates and lumbers his way to Lisa’s house, where she – quite by chance – is all alone in her bedroom. The creature is missing a hand and it’s not long before he and Lisa are on the lookout for a replacement…

I honestly want to like this, but almost everything about it misfires. The ‘jokes’ fall flat from the word go; the direction (by Zelda Williams) is perfunctory at best and occasionally rather confusing. While the 1989 setting is decently evoked, the dialogue that emerges from the mouths of the mostly young cast sounds like nothing anyone of that age would ever say. Newton does her best with what she’s been given, but deserves better lines to deliver. It doesn’t help that for nearly all of the film, her co-star Sprouse is only able to make various grunts, growls and shouts. 

The film lurches clumsily onwards, powered only by its own internal logic, but when that logic is so fatally flawed, it takes every ounce of my will to stay in my seat until the end. Sorry to all involved, but this feels like a waste of a sizeable budget that could have been spent on something better than this muddled mess.

1.5 stars

Philip Caveney