Review Category: Movie

Review: Evangelion – 3.0 You Can (Not) Redo / Cert: 12 / Directors: Hideaki Anno, Kazuya Tsurumaki, Masayuki, Mahiro Maeda / Screenplay: Hideaki Anno / Starring: Megumi Ogata, Akira Ishida, Kotono Mitsuishi, Megumi Hayashibara, Yuko Miyamura, Maaya Sakamoto / Release Date: TBC

Scotland Loves Anime is an annual festival which takes place in Edinburgh and Glasgow, showcasing the new and the classic while celebrating all the weird, wild and wonderful worlds that Japanese anime has to offer. Among its offerings was Evangelion: 3.0 You Can (Not) Redo.

14 years have passed since the apocalyptic climax of You Can (Not) Advance. After removal from the orbital prison in which he and Unit-01 have been interred the entire time, Shinji returns to a world he does not recognise, a decaying crimson wasteland whose denizens are devoid of hope. Treated with contempt by his former friends and informed he is no longer needed as a pilot he attempts to find answers.

Things are starting to get weird. The 14-year time jump is only the start of how disjointed Evangelion‘s latest instalment seems. Now that all intended parallels with Neon Genesis have been burned through, the film saga is spinning off in its own direction. However, it seems to be required that this new direction be established before embarking on it, and there is some confusion as to what it actually is.

You Can (Not) Redo seems like a placeholder film, the new developments never properly established, or true justification given for off-screen character development. The latter scene is at its greatest with Misato; gone is the friendly, fun-loving young woman and in her place is a cold and distant soldier whose only purpose is to do what must be done at whatever the cost. Revelations are thrown out with little foreshadowing and almost as little consequence, such as Asuka and Mari still appearing to be 14 although both now pushing 30, which is the “curse” of piloting an Eva (also not explained). A lengthy chunk of the film is devoted to new pilot Kaworu Nagisa (whose presence was glimpsed in the previous two films) explaining to Shinji what has become of the world in a number of scenes laden with homoerotic subtext.

A major letdown is the absence of what made the rest of the saga so engaging, namely the developing relationships between the characters amidst the constant threat from the next potential Angel attack. Both are now stagnating, with everyone treating Shinji with unjustified passive aggression and the sense of urgency the Angels provided abandoned for the sake of establishing the new status quo.

While the animation is as spectacular as ever and the battle sequences are complex and inventive, the actual plot development is somewhat obtuse. Knowledge of the world’s workings presumably unearthed during the time skip is thrown out as justification for actions, but rarely do they make much sense when placed against what was previously established. Put simply, it’s not difficult to follow what’s going on, just why it is. Most frustrating is that nobody bothers to explain to Shinji what the hell happened and why everyone now seems to hate him, the two most important details driving the story. Granted, doing so would have likely made the film about 20 minutes long, but that might not necessarily have been a bad thing.

Expected Rating: 7 out of 10

Actual Rating:

Review: Saving Mr. Banks / Cert: PG / Director: John Lee Hancock / Screenplay: Kelly Marcel, Sue Smith / Starring: Emma Thompson, Tom Hanks, Colin Farrell / Release Date: November 29th

Disney’s Mary Poppins (1964) is one of the few fantasy films, which virtually everyone with even a passing interest in cinema seems to know. What most people aren’t aware of however is the true story of P.L. Travers, the woman whose damaged childhood in Australia gave life to the iconic, no-nonsense nanny who brought magic into the lives of the Banks family at No 17, Cherry Tree Lane.

For a period of twenty-odd years the master storyteller Walt Disney courted Travers, trying to persuade her to let him bring the magical Mary Poppins to the big screen. Eventually in 1961, Travers agreed to travel to Hollywood to meet Disney and discuss the development of the film. The following fortnight, which Travers spent in America, created a drama almost as legendary as the film it produced.

The relatively straightforward story of Disney’s Saving Mr. Banks, starring that most English of actresses Emma Thompson as Travers, alongside the archetypal Hollywood star Tom Hanks as the jovial Disney, focuses on the programme of persuasion which Disney embarked upon in order to get Travers to allow him to recreate his interpretation of her books. Its no frills approach allows room for each of the main actors to bring a group of highly complex individuals to life on screen in a way which, though it may not necessarily make you like the characters, does create a degree of sympathy for each of them. After watching the film’s depiction of her early years – with a father (played with uncharacteristic mellowness by Colin Farrell) who escaped his humdrum life as a bank manager (inspiration for the character of Mr. Banks) with the help of his vivid imagination and a bottle of whiskey; her well-meaning yet hopelessly overwhelmed mother (Mrs. Banks); and a wealthy aunt who seemed to appear from nowhere shortly prior to her father’s death, bringing a semblance of order to the young girl’s life (Mary Poppins) – you can understand why Travers felt so attached to her creation, and was so distraught when she saw what Disney did to it.

Equally well, the film subtly shows Disney’s well-documented darker side. Though on the face of it he was a warm and friendly man who won Travers over in part by constantly telling her how much her stories meant to his daughters, he clearly kept his own long-term goals in sight.

In Saving Mr. Banks director John Lee Hancock and writer Kelly Marcel have created a film in which the narrative flits between turn-of-the-century Australia and 1960s California, seamlessly melding the two periods of Travers’ life. By including snatches of Mary Poppins’ songs and iconic imagery, Marcel’s screenplay also creates a fresh and engrossing film, whilst respecting the original – an enviable achievement in anyone’s book.

Expected Rating: 6 out of 10

Actual Rating:

Review: Escape Plan / Cert: 15 / Director: Mikael Håfström / Screenplay: Miles Chapman, Jason Keller / Starring: Sylvester Stallone, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Curtis “50 Cent” Jackson, Jim Caviezel, Vinnie Jones / Release Date: Out Now

The Expendables franchise in 2010 gave action fans an orgasmic situation on-screen, the first meeting of ’80s icons Sylvester Stallone and (then governor) Arnold Schwarzenegger in one scene… together. The 2012 sequel further expanded their screen time but never have the two shared one film entirely, until now. Escape Plan, despite a bland title, has a lot to ingratiate itself to ’80s kids brought up on a strict diet of Cobra, Commando, Predator and First Blood. However, this film is not quite the explosive, balls-to-the-wall, all-out actioner many may be expecting and indeed those awaiting a grand Arnie vs  Sly showdown may leave a touch disappointed. That being said, this action-thriller (with sci-fi elements) came to entertain and it certainly accomplishes that aim.

The story focuses on Ray Breslin (Stallone), a man who tests the security of prisons for a living. However, with a new ‘shady’ assignment he is offered the chance to test a whole new level of prison. Not too soon after, he is set up and imprisoned in a structurally sound complex known as ‘The Tomb’. In his attempts to escape, he must work with fellow inmate Swan Rottmayer (Schwarzenegger) and formulate a plan. The plotting, though smarter than the norm, is a little Lock-Up in nature.

There is no doubting that this film may have come 30 years too late to reach its full potential but as they say, better late than never. Though the action is not as plentiful as some of the stars’ biggest hits, there are engaging thrills to be had and the comedic backbone is most welcome. Schwarzenegger looks to be having a ball in his part, dropping cheesy lines and chomping up the atmosphere. Stallone shows once again, for a fella his age, he has many rounds left yet and there are some surprising (and well played) appearances from the likes of Vinnie Jones, Curtis Jackson and Sam Neil, as well as a tie-strokingly over-the-top bad guy in the shape of former on-screen Jesus, Jim Caviezel. Everyone is having fun with the preposterous material and it’s infectious.

In fairness, the action, though fun, could have been much better and the brief scrap between Stallone and Schwarzenegger is not the one fans have been eager to see all these years. Additionally the camerawork occasionally vibrates too vigorously during the fight sequences, meaning some aspects are hard to fully take in. Håfström directs with a firm touch and one machine gun scene in particular plays on Arnie’s cinematic reputation. Even so, there is a feeling more could have been done with Escape Plan (formerly The Tomb but renamed– perhaps to avoid jokes regarding the leads’ respective ages).

Escape Plan is not as playfully knowing as The Last Stand or as action-packed as Bullet to the Head but it’s entertaining and it utilises its leading men’s macho chemistry (ironic considering their off-screen past) to a good effect. It may not be art but when Arnie pronounces, “You hit like a vegetarian”, I doubt anybody will be crying over not getting the film equivalent of a Monet. Good Saturday night, ’80s saluting, fun.

Expected Rating: 8 out of 10

Actual Rating:

Review: Ender’s Game / Cert: 12A / Director: Gavin Hood / Screenplay: Gavin Hood / Starring: Asa Butterfield, Harrison Ford, Ben Kingsley, Abigail Breslin / Release Date: October 25th

Based on Orson Scott Card’s 1985 novel, Ender’s Game is a very curious cinematic creature indeed. As a cross between Harry Potter and Starship Troopers, it’s undoubtedly a powerful and at times thought-provoking sci-fi parable but it does seem to fall between two poles-apart stools. Is it a children’s film (the core cast are all youngsters) or is it an adult sci-fi movie using young characters to craft a subtle political allegory, which holds up a mirror, as the best SF should, to the world we live in today? Superficially it’s a big, broad space opera but it’s also desperately talky, low on action and proper thrills and it delivers the most anti-climactic climax in recent genre cinema history. In some ways Ender’s Game is to be applauded for giving the audience what it doesn’t expect and foregoing empty spectacle for something a little more introspective but the end result is a film which seems oddly uncommercial and which may seriously struggle at the box office.

In the future the Earth has successfully repelled – at some cost to life, limb and property – an invasion by a race of alien insects called the Formics (renamed from the much more sniggerable ‘buggers’ of the novel). Earth’s governments are twitchy about a possible second attack and they’re monitoring gathering Formic forces out in deep space. What they need is a new and imaginative way of tactical thinking and to this end(er) they recruit a bunch of game-literate kids who, it’s hoped, can bring a more instinctive and intuitive approach to the battlefield. One such ingénue is Andrew ‘Ender’ Wiggin (Butterfield), an introverted but brilliant young boy who is press-ganged into joining the International Fleet’s Battle School space station training facility. Here Ender slowly earns the respect of his contemporaries and his elders and finds himself in the Command School and potentially in charge of the entire space fleet. But first he has to prove himself in one final strategic war game simulation where the stakes are the future of Earth itself…

Ender’s Game, despite its good intentions and its remit to tell a proper, hard SF story instead of the usual humans vs. monsters stuff, is just a bit dull. There’s plenty of CGI loveliness to gawp at if you’re so inclined – the initial recreation of the final battle in the first confrontation between humanity and the Formics promises thrills and spills to come – but much of it is fairly mundane spacescape/space station stuff which has a certain 2001 realism about it but quickly becomes tedious to look at. Weightless training sequences seem to go on forever without much in the way of incident and it’s this uneventfulness, which scuppers the back half of the movie once it’s established its world and its story. Ender himself is painfully young-looking and is cold and rather emotionless as a lead character – that’s sort of the point of him, it’s what makes him special and ideal for the task he’s being trained for – but it makes it tough to root for him or care much what happens to him. And unfortunately, not much does happen to him. Under the watchful eye of gruff Colonel Graff (Harrison Ford looking suitably grizzled and war-weary) Ender slowly becomes more assured and more determined. Unfortunate casting ensures that scenes of Ender being tormented by young senior trainee Bonzo, are left floundering by the fact that the actor who plays him (Moises Arias) is about half Butterfield’s size and what looks like a budding romance between Ender and fellow student Valentine (Breslin), which would have given the film a much-needed touch of humanity, comes to nothing. A last-minute appearance by Ben Kingsley as a bizarrely face-painted military hero seems to have little point other than to give Ender a confidence boost and it serves merely to undermine the dramatic punch of the battle which ended the first war between Mankind and the Formics.

Ender’s Game struggles to engender much real enthusiasm but there’s still plenty to admire in its visual aesthetic (it builds its world with utter conviction), its faultless FX and its very worthy attempt to tell a more intelligent SF story than cinema audiences may be used to. But it’s the very fact that it is intelligent and doesn’t go in for cheap thrills and spills which is likely to prove to be its undoing. Time may well see Ender’s Game become a genre classic but modern blockbuster-soaked audiences are likely to be frustrated by its heel-dragging and its sense of inertia.

Expected Rating: 8 out 10

Actual Rating:

Review: Magical Sisters Yoyo and Nene / Cert: PG / Director: Takayuki Hirao / Starring: Sumire Morohoshi, Ai Kakuma, Miyuki Sawashiro, Takahiro Sakurai, Takako Honda, Rio Sasaki / Release Date: TBC

Scotland Loves Anime is an annual festival that takes place in Edinburgh and Glasgow, showcasing the new and the classic while celebrating all the weird, wild and wonderful worlds that Japanese anime has to offer. Magical Sisters Yoyo and Nene was among its offerings.

Yoyo and Nene are the Cursery Sisters, witches with a freelance curse-breaking business in the magical realm of Sorceria. When odd buildings begin falling from the sky, Yoyo takes it upon herself to investigate, bringing her to Yokohama in our world. When buildings continue to disappear and drop into Sorceria’s forest, along with anyone becoming cursed if they make a wish using a mysterious mobile game, Yoyo must uncover the cause of the chaos if she ever wants to be able to go home. But with magic in our world considerably less potent, she may need help. 

Billed as a mystery film and with very few specific details given, Magical Sisters still managed to almost sell out the screening; such is the power of challenging people to take a chance. It’s very much a family film; one that children can watch by themselves, but also one where parents certainly won’t get bored if required to sit through it with them. The story is simple and undemanding, but never once even approaches boring, even during lull points where it figures out where it’s going next.

The vanishing buildings and spreading curses provide most of the conflict, the danger for the most part remaining in the background, with Yoyo’s antics in investigating instead providing much of the events of the story. Her boundless enthusiasm for this world, which to us is mundane but to her is a mysterious adventure, makes her impossible not to love. That, along with her dedication in doing the right thing, means you’ll never stop rooting for her. It’s a long way into the film before any adults even appear, and even then it’s still only through the combined efforts of the kids that things are resolved. From this, children can take away the message that even young people can and should always do what they’re able to in order to help others. 

The animation is bright and colourful but not so much as to induce a sensory overload, while everything is portrayed with the innocence of a child’s perspective and the welcoming acceptance that goes with it; despite having a bare skull for a head, Yoyo’s pet cat Bikhau is still cute and adorable. There are a few emotionally poignant moments that may upset very young children, but they are swiftly moved past and shouldn’t affect anyone’s enjoyment.

Although Yoyo and Nene are referred to as witches, they are not the hex-slinging hags of western tradition: the term is instead a rough and ready translation for the anime convention of so-called “magical girls” (think Sailor Moon). Magical Sisters is a colourful, vibrant and joyous delight from start to finish, and it’s impossible to be left cold by its infectious energy.

Expected Rating: 8 out of 10

Actual Rating:

Review: In Fear / Cert: TBC / Director: Jeremy Lovering / Screenplay: Jeremy Lovering / Starring: Ian de Caestecker, Alice Englert, Allen Leech / Release Date: November 15th

In Fear is powered by a beautifully simple dramatic conceit. A young couple, just two weeks into a new relationship, is on their way to a music festival somewhere in Ireland. As a romantic gesture, Tom (De Caestecker, now one of the Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.) has booked a room in an off-the-beaten-track country hotel so that he and Lucy (Englert) can get to know each other a little better before they meet up with friends. But they quickly get lost in wild, unfamiliar countryside, signposts directing them to the hotel send them round and round in circles; it’s getting dark, the petrol’s running low and there’s someone outside intent on seriously spooking them.

Writer/director Jeremy Lovering has crafted an incredibly taut, uncomfortable and intensely claustrophobic thriller. Set largely inside Tom’s car, the film is for the most part a two-hander, the playful and yet slightly nervous getting-to-know-you relationship between Tom and Lucy, turning into something edgier as they begin to appreciate first that they’re completely lost in unfamiliar territory and later that they’re being targeted by someone with a grudge out in the encroaching darkness. Tom’s jokey, eager-to-please banter and Lucy’s slightly coy standoffishness are quickly forgotten as night falls and desperation and panic set in. Lovering employs tight close-ups inside the car to create a real sense of dread accentuated by subtle, underplayed scares; half-seen figures looming out of the darkness or lurking at the side of the road, Lucy’s clothes stolen from the car during a moment when it’s left unattended (the first real sign that something a bit odd is going on) and finally an ominous encounter with the terrified, bloodied Max (Leech) who quickly becomes an unwanted passenger.

A grim situation starts to get a whole lot worse – and just a little bit less plausible – for Tom and Lucy and it’s only now that the pair, who have already shown a tendency to behave irrationally, by constantly getting in and out of their relatively secure car in the dead of night on the vaguest of whims, begin to make decisions that can only encourage the audience to throw their hands up in despair and wail “Why the Hell did you do that?” There’s one particular moment when Tom, perhaps to reassert his mastery over the situation and his own masculinity, takes matters into his own hands and thereby sets the tone for the film’s last act which is at once unbearably grim and impossibly frustrating because it could have been so easily avoided.

But for the most part In Fear, largely improvised with the two leads only broadly aware of the general direction of the story, is a quiet triumph. Gripping and immaculately staged, it’ll strike a chord with anyone who’s found themselves driving along narrow, muddy, unfamiliar country lanes in the early evening with no real idea where they’re going and hopefully serve as a reminder that, sometimes, there’s nothing quite like a handy Travelodge.

Expected Rating: 6 out of 10

Actual Rating:

Review: Thor: The Dark World / Cert: 12A / Director: Alan Taylor / Screenplay: Christopher Yost, Christopher Markus, Stephen McFeely / Starring: Chris Hemsworth, Natalie Portman, Tom Hiddleston, Kat Dennings, Stellan Skarsgard, Christopher Eccleston, Anthony Hopkins, Rene Russo, Chris O’Dowd / Release Date: October 30th (UK), November 8th (US)

As DC Comics dither or else fumble the ball with the cinematic exploitations of their superhero titles, Marvel Studios continue to knock it out of the park time and again with their immaculately planned slate of costumed hero action movies. Thor: The Dark World hammers home the advantage, leaving recent Dark Knights and Men of Steel grubbing around in the dirt looking tired, underwhelming and derivative. TDW joins and possibly even surpasses Iron Man 3 as the superhero movie of 2013; it’s bigger, brasher, bolder and a damn sight more fun than Kenneth Branagh’s worthy, pompous, low key (it’s the joke that never stops giving) 2011 debut for Chris Hemworth’s twinkling, muscle-bound Asgardian adventurer. Taking its cue from Marvel’s Avengers Assemble this a movie with a spring in its step, its tongue in its cheek and its money right up there on the screen.

One of the great delights of Marvel’s movies is the sense of interconnectedness they’ve achieved across the last few years, with each film harking back to the last (or earlier) and hinting at the next (or later). In this second solo outing for Thor, Loki (Hiddleston) has been returned to Asgard to face the wrath of Dad Odin (Hopkins at his booming best) to atone for his attack on New York in the Avengers movie. With his bitter half-brother imprisoned, Thor sets about bringing peace to the Nine Realms, but lurking in the darkness is an ancient, timeless enemy of Asgard – the monstrous Malekith (Eccleston), and his army of elves will stop at nothing to secure the terrible power source known as the Aether, which will give Malekith dominion over all Creation. Back on Earth, Jane Foster (Portman) has been waiting two years for Thor to return and she’s moving on – just as her ditzy assistant Darcy Lewis (Dennings) and the new intern (“my name’s Ian”) make a discovery which will bring two worlds quite literally together.

Thor: The Dark World sets out its stall from the outset with breathless battle sequences depicting the fall of Malekith and his elf army and his loss of the Aether at his moment of glory, sending him into a self-imposed exile as he regathers his strength, followed by Thor’s titanic struggles to save the realm of Vanaheim from invaders. Fortunately the film quickly finds its sense of fun as we’re taken back to Earth to see Jane playing the dating game (a glorious cameo from Chris O’Dowd) and, right across the spectacle and adventure which follows, it never really loses its sense of fun. The script, driven by newcomer Alan Taylor‘s zesty, enthusiastic direction, finds the perfect balance, leavening potentially heavy Asgardian God-stomping with zippy one-liners and neat visual gags (Thor considerately hanging Mjolnir on a handy hatpeg in Jane‘s flat being a particular favourite). But where Iron Man tends to get its humour just from Robert Downey Jnr, here everyone gets a look in and the chance to let a bit of light into the drama; from Stellan Skarsgard’s Erik Selvig and his determination to remain trouserless, to Loki trading whip-crack witticisms with the more stoic and square-jawed Thor. And of course it’s the relationship between Thor and Loki (and the growing bond between Thor and Jane) which underpins the movie despite all the chaos, carnage and good-natured (or maybe that should be God-natured?) comedy; they hate and distrust each other but ultimately they have to stand and fight side by side in the name of the greater good. And it’s one Hell of a fight, from Malekith’s Ark vessel ploughing into Asgard itself, laser-blasting  soldiers chasing Thor and his group fleeing the stunningly-realised realm of Asgard on a zippy Stars Wars-like skimmer, to the final apocalyptic finale in Greenwich which does for London what the Avengers did for New York.

Some may sniff at the general perfunctoriness of the plot which basically entails a big super-powered God/baddy (Eccleston missing much of the fun in an unavoidably one-note role) trying to lay his hands on an awesome weapon which will give him ultimate power.  There’s also much convenient scientific mumbo-jumbo which is pretty much a Macguffin to allow characters to leap handily across space and between worlds (itself leading to a couple of tasty gags). But the guts of the story serves not only to add flesh to the Thor/Loki dyanmic but to strengthen Thor’s bonds to humanity and point him in the general direction of his true destiny. The obligatory cameos and codas are all present and correct from one hilarious in-movie sequence (and we’re not talking the inevitable appearance by Stan ‘The Man’ Lee) to two post-credits codas, one of which suggests a weird and wonderful Marvel movie yet to come.

The Dark World plays with an infectious joy, charm and energy which can only have been generated by the success of the Avengers movie, allowing the Thor team to craft this thrilling, dynamic and occasionally laugh out-loud sequel that sets a new bar for the cinematic superhero genre.

Expected Rating: 7 out of 10

Actual Rating:

Review: Wolf Children / Cert: PG / Director: Mamoru Hosoda / Screenplay: Mamoru Hosoda, Satoko Okudera / Starring: Kumiko Aso, Yukito Nishii, Haru Kuroki / Release Date: October 25th

It’s the old story. Girls meets boy. Boy turns out to be a wolf. Boy and girl get together and have cubs. Then boy drowns in a canal and is dumped by his tail into a black bin liner. What’s a girl to do – except, perhaps, go on The Jeremy Kyle Show?

Answer: move to the country. And this is what Hana, the heroine of Wolf Children, does, settling into a crumbling, My Neighbour Totoro-style house in the sticks with her two shape-shifting kids, Yuki and Ame, after the untimely death of their father. Yuki, a boisterous little girl, loves the change of locale, but Ame, her timid younger brother, is far less keen. However, as the years roll by and one learns more about being a human while the other learns more about being a wolf, their roles slowly reverse: now it’s Ame who feels the call of the wild and Yuki who feels the call of, y’know, having a boyfriend and hanging out with her besties at school. But can the children control the two sides of their nature, or will they end up tearing the family apart in a flurry of flying fur?

Wolf Children begins in unpromisingly mawkish fashion. The bits where Hana and her bloke play happy families in a cramped starter flat are too twee for words, and that whole section looks slightly cheap too, the simplistic character designs not gelling at all well with environments cluttered with washing machines, rice cookers and electric heaters. However, things buck up considerably once the shift to Totoro-land is made. There’s an enjoyable sequence where Hana learns the ins and outs of farming from her grumpy but kindly neighbours, and the kids become more interesting as they grow up and achieve self-awareness.

The animation budget seems to be stacked towards these latter stages too – witness the exhilarating scene where Ame, in wolf form, explores the mountains above his home with an animal that has become his mentor, and a powerful, climactic storm sequence full of rushing cloud, pelting rain and swirling foliage. Stick with it and Wolf Children eventually rewards your patience, but there’s no doubt that it gets off to an iffy start and that it could have done with taking itself a little less seriously – after all, it’s hard not to smirk knowingly at these lupine shenanigans in this post-Twilight age. Still, you’ve got to love a film that takes time away from the drama to teach you how to grow potatoes.

Expected Rating: 8 out of 10

Actual Rating:

Review: Young, High and Dead / Cert: 18 / Director: Luke Brady, Jonathan Brady, Daniel Fenton, Thabo Mhlatshwa / Screenplay: Luke Brady / Starring: Hannah Tointon, Louisa Lytton, Philip Barantini, Matthew Stathers / Release Date: Available Now

A group of friends, celebrating impending nuptials, head to the woods for a weekend of camping, boozing and getting well and truly stoned. This film, as the old saying goes, does what it says on the tin. When our heroes inadvertently pitch up at the impromptu burial site of a murdered young child, we have the recipe for a traditional slasher bloodbath on our hands. Only this time, with ex soap opera actors.

Tointon (Hollyoaks) and Lytton (gangster’s daughter Ruby Allen in EastEnders) are our scream queens, and a fairly solid job they do of it, too. With the film working on a very low budget scale, we can’t hold it to the same standards as your average slick Hollywood slasher, but it does beg the question ‘how cheap is it to hire an ex-soap actress (or two) anyway?’ Whatever the cast were paid, they were worth it, since they carry the film past its dizzying handheld shaky-cam opener. By the time Gary shows up with his big box of drugs, we were hooked enough to see Young, High and Dead through to its conclusion.

Detractors of no-budget horror will no doubt be unimpressed, but the more resilient fans of indie cinema should find something to enjoy. Tointon, who acquit herself well enough in The Children, is the best of the bunch here, although everyone is a cut above the usual amateurs who tend to populate this sort of thing. We’re sure there’ll be plenty who disagree once they hear Gary’s awful Brummy accent though, and it would be nice if the film could kill off a few of its characters a bit quicker.

Well-written, creepy and with a startlingly, authentically nasty streak, it’s inherently British (you don’t get much more English than chugging cider and Kronenberg beer in the woods) and refreshingly not terrible.

Review: Hell Baby / Cert: TBC / Director: Robert Ben Garant, Thomas Lennon / Screenplay: Robert Ben Garant, Thomas Lennon / Starring: Rob Corddry, Leslie Bibb, Robert Ben Garant, Thomas Lennon / Release Date: TBC (UK)

Hell Baby is exactly the type of movie you would make with your friends if some studio executive got high, gave you $2 million, and told you to have something on his desk after the long weekend. Which isn’t necessarily a bad thing.

Ironically though, the makers of Hell Baby were given full studio backing and carte blanche to do practically whatever they wanted, by executives still in control of their motor skills. Allegedly. Actors/screenwriters Robert Ben Garant and Thomas Lennon also share directorial duties on the film, which has more in common with the Reno 911! duo’s early sketch comedy troupe The State, than it does with any of the recent horror/comedy offerings.

The film opens with married couple Jack and very pregnant Vanessa (Corddry and Bibb), moving into their newly purchased New Orleans McMansion, lovingly nicknamed ‘Maison de Sang’ (or, ‘House of Blood’ for those unfamiliar with Louisiana creole). Very quickly they suspect that all is not as it seems, as Vanessa begins to exhibit demonic tendencies severe enough to garner the attention of the Vatican’s most elite exorcism duo, Fathers Sebastian and Padrigo (Garant and Lennon). Throw in a pair of improv-heavy cops (Rob Heubel and Paul Scheer), a possessed foetus, and a 1970s playboy, and you have the ingredients of the year’s most ridiculous and self-indulgent horror-comedy.

This decadence, however, proves to be the proverbial double-edged sword. Though prolonged scenes chronicling the principle cast demolishing Po-Boys and ‘pizza salad’ are funny in isolation, the overuse of them at the peril of narrative turns the film into a trivial and absurd exercise.

It’s also a shame that Rob Corddry is forced to be the straight man to Keegan Michael Key’s frankly exasperating neighbour, F’resnel – a character who demonstrates the oppressive restrictions of the budget better than any – using the same old joke over and over again, to the point of numbing the audience.

Yet in reality, Hell Baby is solid B-movie material, something you won’t regret watching at 2am with a handful of your closest friends. If the film were a pizza, it’d be a 28” Meat Feast with chillies, chicken nuggets, and chocolate raisins (I don’t know, I don’t eat pizza), held together by a disappointingly weak ass cheesy base.

Extras: None