New Release Review - Elfie Hopkins

Directed by: Ryan Andrews

Starring: Jaime Winstone, Aneurin Barnard, Rupert Evans, Ray Winstone, Kimberley Nixon

When the inhabitants of a small Welsh village start disappearing, amateur sleuth Winstone suspects her new neighbours and proceeds to investigate.

This has been promoted as a horror movie, it's not. This belongs to that most odious of genres: the stoner comedy, "Nancy Drew" meets "Juno" for the "Harry Potter" generation. And yes it is as bad as that combination sounds.
Winstone has one of those faces you just want to slap and it doesn't help that her character is obnoxious, a moody smartass teen who just needs a good clip round the ear. If these are the role models teens have it's no wonder young people are so messed up today. (Now get off my damn lawn).
There's some nice use of color in the production design but this is underwhelmed by the awful photography. Bad enough that it's shot on video and is therefore soft focus to begin with, but the cinematographer insists on pursuing the old vaseline on the lens look. I kept wanting to take a J-cloth to the screen. There's one sequence involving balloons that is the most irritatingly edited piece of film in a long while.
This might be set in Wales but it's very much of the middle-England variety, inhabiting the world of JK Rowling and Nick Park. That's my idea of hell to be honest, I can't abide that sort of quirky British quaintness that American viewers seem to lap up.
If "Jennifer's Body" mixed with "Last Of The Summer Wine" sounds like a good time this just might be the movie you've been looking for.
3/10

---