You've got a low-budget British flick that takes it's cues and inspirations from Hammer's B-grade psychological thrillers of the sixties, Pete Walker's grisly seventies output and hip indie nouveau noir 'tec stylings like Rian Johnson's BRICK.
What that combination gives you is a quirky, oddly engaging mid-level chiller with some nearly fulfilled aspirations towards being a cool, self-deprecating "cult" article with teen appeal. The problem with films that aspire to being cult items is they are mostly doomed to failure in that aim. Cult films are not intentionally made, not defined as such by their creators, rather they become that way after they are made and by what happens next in terms of public and fan responses.
Difficult to know who this film will satisfy. Hardcore splatter fans will be underwhelmed, whereas the gore in the last act might repel the more tender souls. It's not atmospherically creepy or unnerving to any great degree, like, THE WOMAN IN BLACK, and it's not a bombast-infused psycho-sledgehammer like THE SHINING. Although it features cannibalism as part of it's raison d'etre, it's not HANNIBAL or FEROX. It is a sort of oddity, but one I feel was designed to be that way. A forced approach, a deliberate attempt to make something eccentric, off-key, a manufactured curate's egg of a film
Bottom line, though, I enjoyed it in a way that lived up to my low expectations - maybe even a bit above and beyond them. I thought the characters were nicely observed and acted. Jaime Winstone's Elfie is a bottle-blonde brat with a chip on her shoulder and a sort of rainbow warrior/grunge fashion style thing going on. Her performance strikes the right balance between impulsivity, ego, stoner-confusion and vulnerability. As her sidekick, whose love for her is unrequited, Aneurin Barnard's Dylan is a nicely rendered foil. Looking and sounding like a Welsh pot-smoking version of Harry Potter once puberty has passed and the real world is trying to impose itself, he gives a very human and well-judged performance.
Jaime's dad - Ray - is on hand in a broad and hokey pantomime cameo, probably as a favour to his little girl who also co-produced, but it's nice to see the two interacting on screen together.
It's a fair effort with clear limitations and flaws, worth a look if you fancy something a bit different from the horror genre. I can see it being a moderate hit on DVD amongst the teen demographic, but it's not going to set the world alight or shake anything up significantly.
And that's about it, Elfie.
What that combination gives you is a quirky, oddly engaging mid-level chiller with some nearly fulfilled aspirations towards being a cool, self-deprecating "cult" article with teen appeal. The problem with films that aspire to being cult items is they are mostly doomed to failure in that aim. Cult films are not intentionally made, not defined as such by their creators, rather they become that way after they are made and by what happens next in terms of public and fan responses.
Difficult to know who this film will satisfy. Hardcore splatter fans will be underwhelmed, whereas the gore in the last act might repel the more tender souls. It's not atmospherically creepy or unnerving to any great degree, like, THE WOMAN IN BLACK, and it's not a bombast-infused psycho-sledgehammer like THE SHINING. Although it features cannibalism as part of it's raison d'etre, it's not HANNIBAL or FEROX. It is a sort of oddity, but one I feel was designed to be that way. A forced approach, a deliberate attempt to make something eccentric, off-key, a manufactured curate's egg of a film
Bottom line, though, I enjoyed it in a way that lived up to my low expectations - maybe even a bit above and beyond them. I thought the characters were nicely observed and acted. Jaime Winstone's Elfie is a bottle-blonde brat with a chip on her shoulder and a sort of rainbow warrior/grunge fashion style thing going on. Her performance strikes the right balance between impulsivity, ego, stoner-confusion and vulnerability. As her sidekick, whose love for her is unrequited, Aneurin Barnard's Dylan is a nicely rendered foil. Looking and sounding like a Welsh pot-smoking version of Harry Potter once puberty has passed and the real world is trying to impose itself, he gives a very human and well-judged performance.
Jaime's dad - Ray - is on hand in a broad and hokey pantomime cameo, probably as a favour to his little girl who also co-produced, but it's nice to see the two interacting on screen together.
It's a fair effort with clear limitations and flaws, worth a look if you fancy something a bit different from the horror genre. I can see it being a moderate hit on DVD amongst the teen demographic, but it's not going to set the world alight or shake anything up significantly.
And that's about it, Elfie.