Rating: C-
Dir: Craig Tuohy
Star: Brad Moore, Jaime Winstone, Gledisa Arthur, Chiara D’Anna
This is a home-invasion film with a twist. The problem is, it’s not as good a twist as it thinks it is. Daniel (Moore) is a successful property developer with a somewhat murky past. For example, the supposedly “affordable housing” project with which he was involved, turned out to be almost entirely for profit. His personal life is considerably less successful than his business life too. He has split up with his wife, and his daughter, Imogen (Arthur), doesn’t like him very much. Today is her sixteenth birthday, and though he has used this to turn down a business function, it feels more of an excuse than a genuine desire to connect with Imogen.
It is thus almost something of a relief to them both when their awkward interaction is interrupted by Imogen noticing a masked figure standing in the back garden. This turns out to be a distraction from the second masked figure, carrying a shotgun, entering the house from the front. It’s a pair of women, whom the credits refer to, based on the Greek theatrical masks each is wearing: Comedy (Winstone) and Tragedy (D’Anna). The former does almost all of the talking: indeed, as home invaders go, she is very voluble. At first, it seems this might be just a casual robbery, but it eventually becomes clear that they know more about Daniel’s business activities than any random burglars. Their awareness doesn’t stop there, and they are particularly intent on demonstrating to Imogen what a bastard her Daddy has been.
We have seen this kind of thing before, most notably in the very effective Malicious. The similar approach here is nowhere as successful, and I think a lot of the blame – responsibility, certainly – goes to Winstone. She’s too damn chatty here, to the point it becomes little more than a loud, buzzing sound, like an annoying mosquito you want to swat away. There are points where the situation does teeter on the edge of going into cruelty with a sadistic edge, but we haven’t been given sufficient reason to empathize with… Well, anyone here. Daniel’s not very nice, Imogen is a surly teenager, and Comedy/Tragedy keep their cards to the chest until too late in proceedings. Eventually, we discover their specific connection, and you’ll be forgiven for thinking, “Hang on a minute…” rather than gasping in shock.
Parts of it are reasonably effective, and I did like the rest of the cast, especially Moore, who has to bear the brunt of the psychological torture [even if he never seems to have heard of an incognito browser window]. You may well be able to work out where this is ending up going before it gets there. I did not. To be honest though, this might have been as much a reflection of my disdain for Comedy’s abrasive and high-volume antics, as the script being clever enough to hide the outcome from me. If there’s a particular moral here, I am not prepared to swear I received it. That’s not necessarily a bad thing, given my general aversion to “message movies”. But it does mean I walked away without any significant impact. It all seemed as obvious as the title, and about as thought-provoking.