Film Reviews by NP

As a title, ‘The Dark’ is about as generic as you can get: it tells you nothing about this film, and so the hope is that you will go in blind as I did, with no preconceptions. The idea of a feral, scarred girl living in the isolated home in which she was abused is a promisingly disturbing one. Her friendship with young Alex (Toby Nichols), whose eyes have been burnt out and cannot see her disfigurement allows us to witness a potentially touching relationship.

My feelings are that having set up this interesting premise, writer/director seems to have trouble bringing the story forward. Once Mina (Nadia Alexander) first speaks, she ceases to become quite so animalistic. Lucid and intelligent as she and Alex both are, the wonder is why they both choose to live this ramshackle, cannibalistic lifestyle – although the end revelation may go somewhere to answering that.

Not quite as interesting as it initially promises to be, ‘The Dark’ is nevertheless a good attempt at something thought-provoking and interesting. My score is 6 out of 10.

This refreshing reimagining of ‘The Invisible Man’ takes some time to get going, but draws you in without you knowing it, employing the ‘Paranormal Activity’ trick of slowly panning across scenes to a point where nothing appears to be happening, getting the audience to believe something is *about* to happen. Even then, when you’re hooked, it is clear Leigh Whannell’s story isn’t quite what fans of previous Invisible Man adventures might be expecting.

For example, the focus throughout is on Cecilia Kass. Actress Elisabeth Moss isn’t the usual heroine in films such as this. She’s not an angsty teen, seen accidently spilling out of tight jeans and a crop-top for the benefit of the camera. Kass’s former partner was manipulative, and has died, leaving her his fortune, and Moss’s performance carries the burden of that with gravitas: great acting, and interesting that the invisible man isn’t the central point for the drama. We ‘see’ things from her point of view – very slowly to begin with. But stick with it – things pay off as time goes on - and there’s a belter of an ending.

All the characters are well played, with the possible exception of James Lanier (Aldis Hodge). He looks great, but his wholesomeness is difficult to engage with; he’s too good to be true – until the very final reel, that is.

It’s interesting that this film succeeded critically and financially, whereas other, higher budgeted Universal horror wannabes did not. It seems intelligence and character has triumphed over big names and CGI to at last kick-start the company’s ‘Dark Universe’ idea. I wish it well. My score for ‘The Invisible Man’ is 8 out of 10.

Well, yes – this is a knock-off of 2018’s ‘The Nun’; but then, everything is a knock-off of something, just with varying degrees of blatancy. Surely if ‘Curse of the Nun’ is entertaining in its own right, there’s no problem, is there?

A low budget venture, director/writer Aaron Mirtes and his cast of actors must know how this production will be regarded as a copy, yet they still give it their all. Lacy Hartselle is particularly good in the title role of Anna, infusing her character with gusto, energy and spirit. There is no real let-up in the haunting either – they are there from the get-go and keep on coming until the end credits.

My only issues are than Anna looks incredibly young to have a daughter and to be embarking on her second marriage – also the recurring ‘hook’ of her questionable attitude to the pizza delivery lad remains in the memory (which is its purpose, I think), but for the wrong reasons: it does her otherwise likeable character no favours whatsoever.

Knock-off or not, this has nothing to do with 2018’s film, other than the ghostly manifestation of the title, and as a venture in its own right, isn’t a bad way to spend 80 minutes of your time. My score is 7 out of 10.

‘The Ungodly’ is ostensibly about two men, is co-written by, and stars, Mark Borkowski. Small-time, wannabe film-maker Mickey, played by Wes Bentley, teams up with extremely shady James Lemac (Borkowski) to conduct an interview, hoping to explore the workings of the mind of a psychopath. What transpires is a tale of two flawed men trying to gain the upper hand in a deadly relationship based on fascination and revulsion.

To ease the dark tone, there are moments of natural humour, in dialogue and relationships which helps to add an extra dose of reality the volatile situation.

The style favoured by director Thomas Dunn is that of unglamorous television documentary, while making good use of the run-down parts of various chosen locations. Mickey is drawn into the world of a serial killer, and really this is a showcase for two very good actors. The supporting cast are all terrific too, even down to smaller roles like that of unfortunate Polish waitress, whose brief scenes are memorable.

As an examination of manipulation and violence, I found this deliberately unspectacular film an enjoyable way to spend 100 minutes. My score is 7 out of 10.

Zack Gold is excellent as the drug-addicted Michael, a junkie unable to quit his addiction despite the adoration of Jess (Cooper Harris), the stomach caressing girlfriend who has little to do except pout smugly for the duration. Her role is to be blissfully pregnant, and that’s it: perhaps a waste of Harris’s talents.

Michael and his daft friends embark on what appears to be a very unwise caper – jeopardising his job and travelling to an isolated forest to get drunk and argue.

I think what impresses me most about ‘The Unraveling’ is the acting – everyone plays their part well. The location is also very effective and well photographed. As for the story, well, ultimately it seems less than the sum of its parts and doesn’t really succeed as a horror, despite a few lightly creepy moments. As a means of kicking an addiction, it doesn’t survive any scrutiny, but it is an interesting premise. My score is 6 out of 10.

At two hours long, it might be argued that the story is spread a little thin. It looks so good, however, and is played so well, that isn’t really a problem.

At times during the early part of this film I was finding it hard to keep up with the flurry of characters that were introduced apace, sometimes in flashback, sometimes not. As events rolled on, though, I found they all had a place, and a story to tell.

I really enjoyed this. A great, sprawling, artily directed production, for all its echoes of classic horror films (‘Eyes with a Face’ and ‘Frankenstein’ come to mind), the result is nevertheless less of a horror than you might imagine – but I can’t see it disappointing anybody.

Of the players, Antonio Banderas gives a menacing and measured performance as Robert Ledgard, and Elena Anaya is excellent, her portrayal of the strangely self-harming Vera giving nothing away as to what is going on behind those big brown eyes. Mt score for this haunting film is 8 out of 10.

An English village endures the filming of a Zombie film on its doorstep. As if that were not enough, locals are found dead, their bodies torn apart.

This is a low budget horror comedy, and glories in it. Silly, funny, with some good performances and some reasonable jokes - some work better than others, which is fair enough – and it actually makes sense.

Director and writer Pablo Raybould isn’t interested in anything too sophisticated, preferring rather to dish out a few giggles during the 83 minute run-time. My score is 6 out of 10.

To begin with, ‘Bone Breaker’ introduces us to a bunch of casually attractive go-getters whose dialogue consists mainly of motivational speeches and modern day cliches, either to themselves or their fellows: ‘Not gonna lie’, ‘that’s the badger’, ‘we only want people that look the part’, ‘I need to be taken seriously’, ‘I’m not just a pretty face’… and so on. It’s established that in this clique, only pretties are allowed, only toned, fitness obsessed skinnies are wanted. On their vibrant platform of the internet, it’s all about self-promotion and followers. If you like spending your time with people that talk like this, you’ll enjoy the characters. Or not, of course – the bitchy exchanges between them encourage us not to take them too seriously. But really, their ‘hashtag’ quotes and exchanges and ideas about their own self-worth are *loathsome*. The gym-bods on very self-satisfied display are surely to be despatched by the mad hammer-dragger at loose in the woods as displayed on the DVD cover. That’s the hope.

The pacing of ‘Bone Breaker’ is odd. The girls are attacked by someone who receives no-build up, and then left. The audience is then treated to drawn out scenes of them in varying degrees of pain, out in the biting wilderness (and it really does look freezingly cold). Their plight is communicated very well (especially Rachel, played by Sophie Jones), but there’s no subsequent progression for ages, before the villain returns to administer a little more bloodless violence.

Exasperatingly, the girls actually see the killer as a fitness rival. “I’m better than you, faster than you,” Ruby (Lucy Arden) taunts the weapon carrying psychopathic antagonist. Not only is this unwise, it demonstrates the swathe of the arrogance and shallowness displayed by the people we are supposedly meant to route for. There’s no need to make our heroines this dreadful.

I noticed a location toward the end that seemed familiar - turns out ‘Boner Breaker’ is produced by many of the same team responsible for ‘Dark Path (2020),’ including writer/director Nicholas Winter. There are further similarities: a cast of mainly strong-minded females, with a handful of ineffectual males; pursuit through woodlands, and the finale, both of which end in a similar manner. My score is 5 out of 10.

This film is nicely acted, richly atmospheric, memorably scored and often very dull.

The opening scenes are effective, but not really intriguing enough to hang 1 hour and 40 minutes of anyone’s time onto. David Cronenberg makes a rare acting appearance as Walter. The performance isn’t memorable, unlike Tuppence Middleton as main character Abby, who is the most consistently good reason to keep watching. For its slowness, there’s also a chaos about the way in which the thin story is told, possibly to engage our interest.

The incidental score by Alex Sowinski and Leland Whitty has attracted comment. A mixture of minimalist ambience and a jazzy cacophony, it reminded me in parts of Yvon Garault’s music for French director Jean Rollin’s early films. An acquired taste for sure, but I really enjoyed it.

It seems director and co-writer Albert Shin was aiming for a small-town David Lynch-ian atmosphere here, but whilst the style is there, the ability to concoct an engaging or eccentric narrative drags a little over the running time. This is a shame, because with about 20 minutes pruning, the quietly effective moments could have been a lot more powerful. For all that, there is an interesting (possible) twist at the end. My score is 6 out of 10.

This is a remake of an early 1980s ‘video nasty’, and features four girls travelling to a wedding. Instead of making their way through American wilderness as in the original, the location is shifted to picturesque England – so why the girls should still be American, especially as the actresses are clearly not native Americans, is a mystery. The accents aren’t too bad, but they’re noticeably not genuine, and that’s to a UK ear. This is a shame as it is the first thing to grab the viewer, which masks the fact that the performances of the four leads are very good indeed, getting even stronger once they find themselves in jeopardy.

However, while it is a given that characters in horror films, especially horror slashers, make illogical, ill-advised decisions, this bunch just keep making nonsensical choices.

The glimpses of the killer are interesting, although the voice is rather silly. There’s inventive use of a rake in one attempted killing, bringing back fond memories of Brigitte Lahaie in Jean Rollin’s classic Euro-horror ‘Fascination (1979)’. Director Dan Allen makes good use of the small budget available – the results are far from ground-breaking, but enjoyable.

My score is 6 out of 10.

In 2013, Film4 Productions released ‘A Field in England’, about a group of characters thrown together during the English Civil War. Filmed in black and white, it threw the men into a maelstrom of hallucinogenic horror. Perhaps it is coincidence, but there are more than a few similarities between that production and ‘The Necromancer’ – and that can be no bad thing. Whereas the 2013 release was filmed in stark black and white and directed by Ben Wheatley, this is in glorious colour and directed and written by Stuart Brennan.

‘The Necromancer’ strives to be a weird and spiritual piece, with moments of strange and demonic horror. The soldiers’ uniforms provide a splash of colour amidst the lush forests and foliage in which the group spend the majority of the 88 minute running time.

While the acting is good, and the cinematography is terrific, the film is sadly dull, spending far too long between anything particularly interesting, or much less frightening, happening. For a low budget venture, it looks great, and the sinister moments are pretty good when they come, but lack the necessary spectacle to sufficiently liven things up.

My score is 5 out of 10.

It starts grim, it ends grim. The locations are beautifully photographed, and the minimalist score helps convey the bleakness and isolation of the piece. Guy Pearce growls intensely through his brief bouts of dialogue as Eric, and Robert Pattinson is effective as slow-minded Rey.

It is all very one note. When grimness is all there is, and there’s no lightness or shocks to break it up, the film becomes sadly dull. I found myself drifting away quite often, and I wasn’t given the impression I missed anything.

Others liked this, and that’s great; but for me, I found it a bit of a chore. My score is 4 out of 10.

At first, I wasn’t at all sure about this. The orchestral swirls and rolling countryside seemed to be ushering in a bigger budget episode of ‘The Waltons’. It’s a slow burner for sure, the thin plot taking second place to mood and atmosphere, which director/writer Sergio G. Sánchez ensures is rich and haunting.

An independent venture, this boasts some excellent performances and never looks like it has skimped on its budget – in fact the locations and set design are reminiscent of a Guerro De Toro production: a haunted house straight out of a child’s nightmare.

The terrific cast includes the mighty Mia Goth, so good the following year in the ‘Suspiria’ remake; Anya Taylor-Joy, equally convincing in 2015’s ‘The Witch’; and Charlie Heaton, from ‘Stranger Things’. But it is George MacKay who really nails it, rising to the challenge of having the most interestingly written role.

Things become distinctly murky in the telling toward the finale, the effect of which doesn’t measure up to what has gone before it. A twist that doesn’t quite work. However, ultimately, this is a highly effective slice of period horror. My score is 7 out of 10.

At first, this seemed to be unfolding as a typical American teen thriller, with everyone you meet being bland and casually attractive. There are times when such films are perfectly entertaining, so I was inclined to continue watching.

Gradually, things became far more interesting than that, and then more interesting still. Just when the viewer is given every reason to believe they know where the plot is going, a twist occurs – and very skilfully, the story takes on a new and unexpected angle. When even that is absorbed, another new development hits out, and once again we have to adjust our expectations. Director Mark Tonderai – who has built up a fine resume since this film, including a couple of episodes of Doctor Who – and writers David Loucka and Jonathan Mostow really know how to manipulate audience expectation, and tease out the truth gradually and expertly. The players, including Jennifer Lawrence (Elissa) and Elisabeth Shue (Elissa’s mother, Sarah), are excellent and invest in their roles wonderfully, underplaying certain scenes and letting things rip when the opportunity arises – and it does!

Not that reviews really matter – mine less than most – but I was surprised to see that this film has received a less-than-stellar reputation in some quarters. Opinions vary as well they should, but I found this so very well done, that it amazed to me that more found it so difficult to enjoy. The twists are wonderful, and they don’t let up, even at the very end. There are reviews assuring us that ‘The House at the end of the Street’ is full of plot holes and doesn’t make sense. Well, as far as I could see, there are no real plot holes (we are teased to think one thing is happening, when the reality turns out to not be what we expect) and it does make sense (at least, within the ongoing instability of the villain). It’s as well to give this film your full attention.

My score is 8 out of 10.

Misleading packaging isn’t anything new. ‘Dark Path’ is a good example of this. On the DVD cover, we’re treated to a close-up of a snarling, multi-fanged creature. The monsters in the actual film, however, don’t appear to be of the same stock. This may explain a lot of the drubbing this production has had from some reviewers, which is fair enough. What isn’t so easy to take seriously, however, is when reviewers watch a low-budget independent film and then slate it for not having a huge amount of money spent on it.

While the monsters themselves my lack bite, a lot else is well done. On the technical side of things, the mostly night-time scenes are well lit and moody, and the sound design – so often a problem in projects of this nature – is perfectly balanced. The characters are mostly well-played and defined, although main player Abi (Makenna Guyler) is relentlessly acerbic; although we find out the reason for it, her spikiness could have done with being dialled down a bit. She and wayward sister Lily (Mari Beaseley) enjoy a kind of ‘ladette’ banter which for the most part works well.

The story was engrossing enough for me not to have noticed that this is a mostly all-female cast until the simpering character of Peter turns up. Played by Jimmy Essex, his involvement is a brief one.

I quite enjoy the way the film is left open-ended; Abi does everything right, and yet her fate doesn’t look promising. Again, some reviewers have decided the film ‘just stops’, which isn’t fair. We’re left at a pivotal moment, which is clearly a deliberate creative decision.

Associate producer is Lucinda-Rhodes Thakanacker, (along with husband Jeet Thakrar) who people may remember for her performances in ‘Harry and Cosh’ and ‘Cavegirl’ among other things. Her recent career seems to have steered her toward the horror genre, which is good to see.

‘A Dark Path’ doesn’t try and reinvent the horror film. Rather, it provides 75 minutes that I found enjoyable, cheesy, absorbing and well produced. My score is 7 out of 10.