CELLULOID SCREAMS 2018: DAY TWO

After Day One's mixture of Cage rage and Michael Myers mayhem, what did Day Two have in store for the Celluloid Screams crowd? Read on...


WHAT KEEPS YOU ALIVE

Loved-up couple Jackie (Hannah Emily Anderson) and Jules (Brittany Allen) head out to a remote woodland location to celebrate their first wedding anniversary and all is going swimmingly until a visitor unwittingly lets slip a piece of information about Jackie which will have Jules questioning everything she knows - or thinks she knows - about her wife...

I've been careful to say as little as I can about the plot because the less you know going into What Keeps You Alive the more you'll enjoy it. Just over 20 minutes in there's a breathtaking surprise in store (I think most of the Celluloid Screams audience had the same "WTF?" reaction I had) and from there on it's fun to just roll with the story to see exactly where it heads next.

Strong performances from Anderson and Allen (both excellent in very different ways, but I can't tell you what those ways are) anchor the somewhat outlandish cirumstances to a bedrock of chilling plausibility, not to mention keeping the tension simmering nicely. There's also plenty of cracking, darkly comic dialogue to be savoured. I just can't tell you what that is for fear of giving something, anything away.

Writer/director Colin Minihan piles on the twists and turns to such an extent that by the end you might feel it's possibly taken one or two too many plot swerves but that's a very minor gripe about a film which confidently raises the suspense stakes time after time. See it and be thoroughly entertained by all of the things I can't tell you about in this mini-review, then you'll know exactly why I'm being so frustratingly light on detail here.

You're getting no more from me on this subject. Go watch.


KNIFE + HEART

Gay porn film producer Anne (Vanessa Paradis) is having relationship trouble with her editor/lover Loïs (Kate Moran) but that's nothing compared to trouble she's about to face when one of her actors is brutally murdered. Using the ongoing police investigation as the inspiration to make a more ambitious adult movie, Anne is fully aware that everyone is a potential suspect or victim as the masked murderer sets about making their own cuts to those involved...

Knife+Heart's refreshingly different setting provides the perfect backdrop to a stylish, giallo-inflected treat, packed with extravagant characters and lurid killings, all sumptuously filmed in gorgeous 35mm, its musical heart driven by a pounding M83 synth score. Paradis is excellent in a complex role and the film-within-a-film's cast are brought to flamboyant life, particularly Nicolas Maury as the sympathetic but no-nonsense Archibald.

The third act, true to the classic examples of the subgenre, dials up the weirdness even more as the killer's background and motives are slowly revealed, culiminating in their attempt to complete their peculiar plan at a cinema where Anne is watching one of her previous productions.

To say I'm a giallo fan is something of an understatement so Un Couteau Dans Le Coeur (to use its French title) was high on my list of must-sees at the festival and it did not disappoint in the slightest. All the elements are present and correct - psychological horror, dreamy interludes, graphic bloodshed and sexploitation - and these seem to be more at home than ever in the close-knit community portrayed here.

The sexuality of the characters is not a big deal here, thank goodness. Yes, I did notice a comment on social media referring to the number of blowjobs in this film but a) they're tastefully framed, b) they're filming an adult movie, that kind of thing is going to happen and c) they're so incidental to the story that I'm not sure why anyone would focus on them. This is a deftly crafted, naturalistic portrayal of the dynamics between a group of LGBT people who just happen to be making porn. Some of us need to grow the fuck up and appreciate the view from elsewhere.

Okay, lecture over. Knife+Heart is beautiful, bloody and brilliant. It has the brutal murders and all of the strangeness you'd expect but it also possesses real warmth and heart plus a welcome dash of intentional comedy. How could you not embrace something that has a character called the Mouth Of Gold?


NIGHTMARE CINEMA

Five people (well, six to be totally accurate as one segment features a couple) wander into a spooky theatre and, once inside, they're each treated to a short movie they probably weren't expecting. The film they're watching features themselves in a tale of terror and chances are it's not going to be "the feelgood movie of the year"...

As a fan of portmanteau movies - especially the Amicus ones such as Asylum and Tales From The Crypt - and with knowledge of the remarkable directorial talent involved I have to admit that I went into this one secretly hoping that it would be great. Unfortunately, I came out of it feeling more than a little deflated.

As with any example of this type, the individual segments should take different approaches (which they do) which means they'll land in different ways (which they do) and as long as the hit-to-miss ratio is acceptably high I don't see how that's an issue. I really didn't expect five classics and nor should I have. Here, out of the five stories, I really enjoyed one, liked one, tried hard to like one but couldn't quite manage to and didn't really care about the other two.

Yes, there's gore aplenty and although there are a number of intriguing ideas bubbling under the surface these take flight very rarely, which means that a particular story ends up going absolutely nowhere, another stops pretty much dead with little revelation while another falls back on having a lot of people meeting bloody ends.

Also, the overarching device - involving Mickey Rourke as the projectionist of the titular theatre - is frustratingly underdeveloped and I would have liked his character to have been fleshed out a little more. Well, make that fleshed out at all. The potential to showcase a great character is pretty much thrown away as all he really ends up doing is pointing out to each unfortunate cinemagoer just how screwed they are.

I wanted to love this so much and it's incredibly frustrating to me that I didn't (judging by the chatter after the screening I'm sure many people rated it highly). I still think there's mileage in the concept though and despite the fact that this missed the mark for me I'm not averse to a Nightmare Cinema 2 with new stories and directors.

CELLULOID SCREAMS 2018: DAY ONE

Celebrating its 10th Edition with a four-day fest instead of the usual three, Celluloid Screams took up its usual residence at the Showroom Cinema in Sheffield with some bold programming choices in its varied slate of films, the showcasing of a hilarious new TV series and an after party which literally refused to quit. But I'm getting ahead of myself. Let's rewind all the way back to Day One which featured two eagerly anticipated movies...

MANDY

Lumberjack Red (Nicolas Cage) is living the quiet life in the wilderness with his bookish, rock chick partner Mandy (Andrea Riseborough) when their idyll is shattered by the arrival of a crazed hippie cult led by the creepy Jeremiah Sand (Linus Roache). Suffice to say some very bad things happen, leading Red down a path of bloody, surreal vengeance...

Re-tooling the revenge flick as a vivid, trippy, retina-scorching nightmare, Panos Cosmatos' debut feature will no doubt alienate as many as it impresses. The deliberately slow build of a first half gives way to a gore-splattered, unfettered riot of a second as Cage takes on LSD-addled bikers from Hell and eventually the cult itself.

It would be easy to focus on Nic going full Cage here but that would be to detract from what is essentially a, ahem, knowing (sorry) and enjoyable performance. Riseborough is, as always, terrific as the bookish, rock chick title character and although Roache's villain has shades of the pantomime baddie he also manages to unnerve and disturb, his performance matching perfectly with the quite frankly batshit crazy things going on here.

The film also looks beautiful, full of wonderfully conceived visions of tranquillity and purgatory. It seems something of a cliché to call this an assault on the senses but that's exactly what it is and some viewers may not stay the distance because of the unrelenting visual and auditory pounding it dishes out. This is an immersive, impressive headf**k, it's off-kilter off the scale and I loved it to bits.

HALLOWEEN

Retconning the Halloween tale so that the story picks up 40 years on from the events of the original movie, Michael Myers escapes during a patient transfer between psychiatric facilities and, after bumping off a few unfortunates who happen to cross his path, he dons the Shatner mask once more and heads back to Haddonfield to confront old foe Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis - I'm pretty sure you didn't need me to point this out).

So, as one of the most anticipated horror sequels for some time, does the 2018 incarnation of Halloween measure up? Well, yes and no. There are some lovely touches, such as the use of the classic theme and a smattering of neatly deployed, pleasing callbacks to the original. Even the opening titles are smart as the pumpkin is quite literally resurrected.

The suspense is competently cranked up too, resisting the temptation to throw in too many fake jump scares (although there are a couple just to keep you on your toes). Michael Myers is a scary enough character to generate tension just by the fact that he's lurking in the background somewhere and the makers of H2018 know this.

The kills are plentiful and surprisingly brutal but this isn't an enterprise which wallows in its gore. It earns its 18 certificate, don't get me wrong, but it isn't a movie which is keen to rub its viewers faces in bloodied viscera and the on- and off-screen murders are balanced rather well.

Unsurprisingly, Jamie Lee Curtis is great and the movie lights up whenever she's on screen. Even a few tired character developments - including the fact that Laurie Strode is now something of a recluse and also has an alcohol problem - don't get in the way as much as they could because Curtis has the presence and the skill as an actress to transcend all of that. It's testament to her performance that, when she's sidelined for a while - to allow new characters to be woven in the plot - you can't wait for her to show up again.

Where the film is less successful is in its introduction of those new characters such as Laurie's daughter Karen, played by Judy Greer. This isn't Greer's fault at all - she's saddled with an underwritten character whose chief role is to be exasperated at the "survive at all costs" mentality of Laurie. There's also a "new Loomis" played by Haluk Bilginer who's actually referred to as "the new Loomis" and who provides the film with an especially clunky left-turn towards the end.

Halloween 2018 isn't the train wreck I feared it would be, nor is it the game changer it could have been. Let's face it, it would have had to go some in order to better Carpenter's landmark of the genre but it's an efficient, enjoyable follow-up that's likely to satisfy a large proportion of horror fans. It's also some way better than most of the sequels (which now exist in a parallel universe as a result of this follow-up).

MILE 22

Starring: Mark Wahlberg, Iko Uwais, Lauren Cohan
Writer: Lea Carpenter 
Director: Peter Berg

James Silva (Wahlberg), part of an elite CIA unit called Overwatch, is tasked with locating a missing shipment of caesium before it can be weaponised and used to kill many thousands of people. Indonesian police officer LI Noor (Uwais) turns himself into the American Embassy claiming to know where the caesium is and he'll make that information known if he can be given safe passage out of the country. Of course, there are various other interested factions who want to stop this from happening...

On the face of it, Mile 22 is a complex, high-tech espionage thriller with a side order of gunfire and martial arts mayhem, marshalled by a director and star whose previous team-ups have proven their chops with both military manouevres (Lone Survivor) and steadily-wound, reality-grounded suspense (Deepwater Horizon). In actuality, however, it's a bit of a mess. No, make that a lot of a mess.

There are numerous moments in both plot and action where it's difficult to know exactly what the hell is going on. Don't get me wrong, I love not knowing where a story is going next but not actually knowing if I'd missed the previous five minutes is just confusing. I looked around the cinema, hoping to catch the gaze of someone else in the audience so I could mouth the words "Do you know what's happening?" but I had no such luck.

The action sequences are edited in such a twitchy manner that the shootouts are robbed of any tension because half of the time you're not sure where anyone is and which person is opening fire on who or what. Worst of all, the major fight in the flick which involves Iko Uwais constantly changes angles - even switching to a view from a security camera - so all you're left with is a headache rather than an adrenaline buzz.

Also, if you're going to cast Ronda Rousey in a film, I expect to be treated to at least one sequence in which she kicks someone's ass into the middle of next week. Yes, it was a surprise that this didn't happen and I accept that this played against my expectations of how her character arc played out. But she's cast as a bad ass, so would it have been so terrible to give her a moment in which she was allowed to give full vent to her undoubted badassery?

A lot of the above could be mitigated to some degree if the characters were engaging but unfortunately they're some of the grumpiest, downright unpleasant people you'll ever spend ninety minutes with. I'm fine that the CIA's top operatives aren't sweetness and light but this bunch are so aggressively horrible to both their enemies and each other that by about half an hour in I was finding it very difficult to care about them. Or anyone else for that matter.

Which brings me to Lauren Cohan. Loved her in both The Walking Dead and The Boy. Here she's handed one of the most exhaustingly depressing characters in movie history. As Silva's second in command Alex, she's usually being told how terrible her informants are and how she can't really do her job properly. Of course, this is just tough love from Silva who's only pretending to be an arsehole to give Alice extra motivation.

Except this isn't true because Silva is a total arsehole, taking a break from said arsehole behaviour only when he decides it's time to be a massive dickhead to all and sundry. Of course, this is because Silva was a gifted kid who had a rough childhood and grew up to be a tactical genius and yes, he might be on the spectrum but dammit! He's the best damned guy they've got. He's just a massive dickhead, that's all.

Anyway, not only does Alice have to contend with the tantrums of Massive Dickhead, she's also got problems with her ex and her globe-trotting job is seriously getting in the way of spending any time with her kid. Cue awkward phone conversations about access when Silva wants Alice to be leaning on Li Noor and/or thinking how about many people she might have to kill to complete the mission.

Likewise with the Indonesian security, headed by Sam Medina as yet another instantly angry and dislikeable sort. He's there to butt heads with Wahlberg and set up the series of chases and gunfights which make up the bulk of the second half. This also leads to a climactic stand-off between the two which redefines the word "disappointing".

Elsewhere, there's a team of Russians monitoring the ongoing action but they're given such scant attention by the story that it's difficult to buy into them as the nominal bad guys or understand their motivation although the story keeps returning to them just a tad too much for them to be a sideshow and a third act reveal lifts the lid on exactly why they're so interested in the mission. It's plausible enough, it ties in well with the earlier events of the plot - and closes the movie on a note that's slightly unexpected - but as with so much about this movie it's vaguely sour and leaves the viewer wondering what the point of the whole thing was.

Unfortunately, Mile 22 isn't worth the trip. The journey is frustratingly lacklustre and the destination is disappointing.

SLENDER MAN

Starring: Joey King, Julia Goldani Telles, Jaz Sinclair
Writer: David Birke
Director: Sylvain White

Four teenage friends interested in the urban legend of the Slender Man decide to participate in a ritual which will supposedly summon him. A week later, one of them disappears and it becomes apparent that she wanted the Slender Man to take her, leaving the remaining three with the task of somehow getting her back...

To say Slender Man was a troubled production is probably something of an understatement. With its featured mythical character previously cited as the motivation for a particularly brutal stabbing committed by two 12-year-old girls in Wisconsin, maybe it wasn't the greatest idea to push on with the movie it but here it is, sneaking out almost apologetically with few trailers, scant publicity and reports of a studio who had shown little or no support for the project.

To add to this, Screen Gems had insisted on a lower, more teen-friendly rating for the movie, the original script underwent radical changes and several scenes were removed over fear of viewer backlash had they been left in the completed product. Is there any way that the movie could somehow transcend all of these things and end up being surprisingly brilliant?

Absolutely not is the short answer.

Slender Man is a total mess from start to finish. The changes to the story are also writ large upon the screen as plot threads are picked up and then dropped unceremoniously, characters - even major ones - drift in and out of the proceedings seemingly at random and the tone is uncertain throughout. The dialogue is often dreadful, most of it being of the type that would only ever be said by teenagers in a movie. 

The powers of the Slender Man are dealt with somewhat inconsistently, setting him up as an entity who can bend reality and take whoever has invoked a connection with him but then having him not do that very thing on several occasions where he quite easily could have. He's unstoppable but this only seems to apply to those moments where the plot requires him to be.

Worse still, it's not scary in the slightest. The Slender Man himself may be an interesting creation but he doesn't generate the necessary dread and the film relies instead on a tiresome series of mechanical jump scares which even the most casual horror fan will consider hackneyed.

Visually it's one of the least inspiring fright flicks of late, its washed-out palette never catching the eye. Even the Slender Man's forest domain, with its tentacle-style branches, comes over as something that's been done before, many times, in much more impressive fashion. Elsewhere, the by-the-numbers camerawork doesn't immerse the viewer in the situation one little bit.

The performances are.....well, you know what? The performances are actually the best thing about this whole sorry business. Despite the utterly inane lines they're saddled with for most of the running time, Slender Man's young leads are all rather watchable, Julia Goldani Telles being the pick of the bunch.

Flat, suspenseless and remarkably dull, Slender Man makes 93 minutes feel like an eternity and for me it's the worst mainstream horror release in a very long time. Its talented cast deserves so much better. Chances of this film getting a sequel? Slender, I think.

UNFRIENDED: DARK WEB

Starring: Colin Woodell, Rebecca Rittenhouse, Betty Gabriel

Writer: Stephen Susco

Director: Stephen Susco

After an amusing opening sequence in which an unseen user attempts to log in to a computer with a series of passwords - some all too familiar, some obscurely rude - we then see the webcam become active and discover said user is Matias (Woodell) who is glad that his new laptop is way better than the previous "piece of crap" he had, mostly because he can continue working on an app he's been developing which will help him communicate better with deaf girlfriend Amaya (Stephanie Nogueras).

Setting up a game night (which was apparently the working title of this flick and I'm guessing was ditched when the Bateman/McAdams comedy/thriller of the same name got there first) on Skype with a group of his friends, Matias is also trying to smooth things out with Amaya as their relationship has hit a rocky patch partly because he isn't really committing to learning sign language.

Things, however, are going to get a lot whole worse than a potential break-up when Matias starts to receive strange messages directed at the previous owner of the laptop and it's not long before the previous owner of the laptop themselves gets in touch to say that it was stolen from them and they really want it back. Now don't you go hunting around that hard drive, Matias...whoops, too late...

I'm not going to give any more away of Dark Web because it heads off in some creepy and interesting directions which may not exactly be groundbreaking in terms of the horror genre but provide some solid chills and a couple of satisfying twists as Matias, his friends and even Amaya inevitably find themselves in danger.

The format is very much that of the original Unfriended, with Messenger conversations aplenty and characters appearing on - and occasionally disappearing from - video chat screens. There's buffering - referred to at one point as "the beach ball of death" - as the technology grinds to a halt, image resolutions break down, there's handy interference which obscures potentially awful things which may or may not be about to happen. In short, the usual ticks and tropes of social media which were exploited fairly well by the original movie.

Dark Web uses all of the above but also layers in an old school bulletin board which has a background animation straight from a level of the first release of Doom and then heads to the other end of the tech spectrum by including a subplot about a cryptocurrency account. These touches are smart without being smart-arsed.

Director (and writer) Stephen Susco is confident enough in the material not to play it for cheap scares, choosing instead to build the suspense slowly and carefully so that by act three the tension has ratcheted up to a genuinely impressive level. Placing each of the characters in their own window heightens the claustrophobia, as well as giving us just enough of their surroundings in the background to familiarise ourselves with their locations but not quite enough to see what might be lurking outside the view of the webcam.

It's probably not too much of a spoiler to reveal that people die in this one. And without reverting to gratuitous gore, what cruel, nasty deaths they are, ushered in by means of a hacked history of the poor victim's online highlights before their fate is engineered in a suitably awful manner. This both sets up the viewer for the kill scene and sets them on edge as to how it will play out.

Assured and accomplished, Unfriended: Dark Web may not ultimately trouble anyone's all-time list of horror highs but it delivers its chills in an efficient, enjoyable, entertaining manner and has no qualms about dispatching characters it's taken the trouble to make you care about. Definitely worth making the connection.

WHITE OF THE EYE

Starring: David Keith, Cathy Moriarty, Art Evans
Writers: China Cammell, Donald Cammell
Director: Donald Cammell

*** THIS REVIEW CONTAINS SPOILERS ***

Around the area of Globe in Arizona, wealthy women are being murdered and the prime suspect appears to be hi-fi expert Paul White (Keith) who makes a living installing bespoke sound systems for rich clients. As the investigation into the killings continues, Paul's wife Joan (Moriarty) begins to question just how much she really knows her husband...

With a stylish, dazzlingly shot opening murder sequence and a Mahler-loving detective (Evans) on the case, White Of The Eye instantly sets itself up as a whodunit and then almost immediately heads in the opposite direction, delving into the relationship between Paul and Joan and flashing back to exactly how their paths crossed, a time when everyone was in 70s threads, Joan was driving across country with snazzily-jacketed Mike (Alan Rosenberg) and Paul was sporting the world's most spectacular mullet.

At this point, anyone tuning in for a high body count and rivers of gore is going to wonder what the hell is going on and the bulk of the first hour plays out more like a particularly off-beat family drama as the Whites do their best to raise daughter Danielle in the right way and the main threat to their domestic bliss doesn't seem to be an ever-tightening police net but the town's ultimate bored, rich housewife Ann Mason (a disturbingly detached Alberta Watson) who has her sights on Paul.

It's the refusal to stick to the expected template of the serial killer movie which makes White Of The Eye so intriguing. The police investigation runs throughout the movie but the film's unconcerned with the mechanics of that procedure and doesn't really focus on generating much in terms of suspense, even if it does throw in a red herring or two from time to time. Neither does it concentrate especially hard on getting to grips with the "why" much beyond one specific scene in which the killer describes their experience of committing murder.

No, this movie has a unique take on familiar themes and if you don't like how it's going about its business it's not going to meet you in the middle. It isn't even going to take so much as a step towards you. You're going to have to do the work here and if you can tap into its skewed world view then there's a lot to enjoy. if not, this is possibly going to be the longest 111 minutes of your life.

The performances are generally excellent, even if there's an argument that Keith's character seems to be something of a nutjob from the moment we first meet him. Cathy Moriarty is brilliant to watch as usual - Joan is smart, sassy and a real match for those around her. Evans (who you might recognise from more commercial fare such as Die Hard 2) brings a pleasingly three-dimensional portrayal to what could have been a standard quirky investigator role and Rosenberg is impressive as the "before" and "after" version of Mike.

If you even take so much as a cursory glance at Donald Cammell's directorial outings previous to this - Performance (co-directed with Nicolas Roeg) and Demon Seed - these point to a creative talent with absolutely no interest in convention. This holds true for White Of The Eye, contrasting the banality of small town life with the sensationalism of violent, gruesome murders but viewing them through its own eccentrically-crafted filter.

The final act is both disconcerting and absolutely bonkers as Paul totally cracks, becoming a genuine threat to the lives of both Joan and Danielle. It's also time for Mike to make a significant re-appearance, leading to an explosive (in all senses of the word) climax. Even this doesn't quite play out as it would in other serial killer flicks, with the complicated dynamic between the principal characters coming to the fore.

And after all of this, White Of The Eye still has one final slice of oddness to serve up, wrapping up with a strange, almost throwaway scene in a diner which ends on a mundane but at the same time bizarre exchange of dialogue, leading the viewer into the credits with a distinct feeling of "Huh?".

It would be easy to give up on this movie early on and its oblique approach doesn't help but this is not a film which is keen to win you over. This is a singular vision from an artist who made films his way and the very fact that this is such a unique experience should give you all the impetus you need to seek this out and soak up the authentic strangeness within.

Tragically, Cammell took his own life in 1996 shortly after completing his next film Wild Side, a troubled shoot which resulted in a movie which was drastically recut by its producers who disliked the original version. Donald Cammell left a legacy of just four feature films shot over twenty-five years but every one of them is worth your time. White Of The Eye is a fine example of the Cammell experience: weird, exasperating, beautiful, sometimes impenetrable but ultimately unforgettable. And we should all be grateful that it exists.

UNFRIENDED: DARK WEB (SCREENING 1)

Starring: Colin Woodell, Rebecca Rittenhouse, Betty Gabriel

Writer: Stephen Susco

Director: Stephen Susco

I don't think I can review this film properly until I've seen a screening of it in which at least most of those who are supposedly watching it aren't talking through most of its running time. So let's review the behaviour of the audience instead.

Okay, so we get the opening bit, in which various passwords are tried on a start-up screen.

"He's trying passwords."

"Heh heh. Password."

"Heh heh. Password. In upper case."

"Heh heh. Did you see what he just typed?" (It was something rude)

At this point I get two teenagers talking about nothing to do with the movie, just for balance.

Then we get the two guys towards the back of the cinema, who seem to be trying material out for their MST3K-style comedy act. It starts badly. No one laughs except them.

A Messenger window appears on screen. Someone reads the entire text of the conversation aloud. The person next to them asks how they can see the text as it's quite small.

There's some text in French. Someone says they can't understand it. Someone else asks whether or not it's in French. Someone else asks how we're supposed to know what it means. I wait to see if the guy uses Google Translate. He does. There's a hush as the words reveal themselves in English. It's like the audience has discovered fire. Maybe this is the point where everyone finally shuts the hell up.

The hush lasts about another five seconds.

The comedy guys give it another shot but there's nothing much happening on screen and it falls flat once again. Timing is everything.

Video files are discovered on the computer and played. It's reasonably obvious what's going on in most of them but there's a very audible "What's going on?" from one of our fellow viewers.

There's a Skype conversation with a deaf girl and the possibility of an intruder in her place. A voice says "Why doesn't she know he's there?" I feel myself getting more stupid by osmosis.

Someone is shown two people and given a choice of who lives and dies. Reaction: "Why's she crying?"

And so it goes on. And on. And on.

"Who's that girl?" "Isn't she from earlier?" "When?" "Isn't she the girl in the video?" "Which video?"

"He's going to die." "Yeah, he's going to die." "He's going to die."

The comedy guys get louder, but no funnier.

Someone falls from the roof of a building and is seen next face down on the pavement in a pool of blood. The unsolicited announcement which follows is "They're dead". I'm glad they pointed that out as the fate of the character seemed pretty ambiguous to me. Oh no, hold on, they fell from the roof of a building and they're now face down in a pool of blood.

The tension in the movie ramps up considerably. Or it would have done had it not been like sitting in a dimly-lit coffee house trying to watch the movie while trying to ignore the conversations of a dozen other people.

CCTV footage plays - you know what's probably coming next, but someone's there to comment loudly upon it anyway, just to batter any last, tiny iota of suspense out of the sequence.

Two people leave when they think the movie is over, strolling past most of the audience then in front of the screen and out of the door, meaning they miss the final reveal. Clue: it was still pitch black in the cinema, they'll raise the lights when the flick is actually done.

The comedy guys give it one last shot as the credits roll, but yet again their banter doesn't land. The two teenagers continue to babble on as they leave the auditorium, having now managed to chatter continuously since the ads began without pausing for breath.

The credits roll. Someone near me says it was a terrible film, which is amazing considering they spent most of it looking at their phone (thanks for lighting up the surrounding area, it was very considerate of you). I make my way out of the place, passing a guy a few rows from the front. He looks fed up and seems to be shaking his head at the rest of us.

Hey, I felt your pain and at that point I was slightly ashamed of the fact I didn't stand up and say something early on in the film but how do you get a whole bunch of people to be quiet when there's just one of you to do it?

I will go to see this again and I hope to be able to review the film itself next time. At far as this screening goes, I'd like to thank those around me tonight for making it such a wretched, frustrating experience. I'd suggest to them how they'd feel if someone sat next to them and constantly disrupted their enjoyment of something they liked but with such short attention spans I don't think it would make any difference to them.

If I want to talk to someone for 90 minutes, I go for a coffee with them, maybe have dinner. I don't sit in a cinema. Call me old-fashioned. Also, call me very pissed off for having my night at the flicks spoiled. End of message.