CHRIS HUNNEYSETT
THE PERSONAL HISTORY OF DAVID COPPERFIELD
Dev Patel, right, plays Copperfield
This belated reboot of a long-dead Hollywood horror franchise is reasonably coherent, borderline competent and not the worst horror movie I’ve seen this week.
I don’t know what dark satanic pact Andrea Riseborough fell foul of to deserve to star in this, but credit to the talented Geordie who gives her all as a detective cop and widowed mother of one.
She’s investigating a series of deaths centred on a creepy suburban house, which suffers from a Japanese curse which once encountered is impossible to escape.
In its favour it relies on physical effects not CGI, and the sound design guys do their damndest to make you jump.
As a grown man hides in a cupboard, there are several unpleasant deaths, bodies in the bath, crazy old crones and a velour bathrobe which made me shiver.
But most terrifying of all is how all this good material manages to be consistently deathly dull. At least you don’t have to have seen any of the previous films in the series to dislike this one.
NO FATHERS IN KASHMIR
There are few more promising dramatic scenarios than teenage romance in a war-torn country, but this modern day coming-of-age tale is more concerned with raising awareness for its tragic real-life background than delivering a gripping spectacle.
Noor, played by Zara Webb, is a British teenager visiting her grandparents who live in Kashmir, the poverty stricken border area which has been at the centre of a war between India and Pakistan since 1947.
Through her relationship with a scooter-riding local charmer played by Shivam Raina, the script explores the tragedy of the thousands of ‘disappeared’ men who have been taken by the army, leaving the village women not knowing if they are wives or widows.
Webb’s smartphone-wielding attitude is wholly convincing, but she occasionally struggles to carry the emotional weight asked of her. And threadbare thriller elements and grim reality sit uneasily with the underpowered romance, and too many characters exist simply to explain a point of view.
There’s no doubting the filmmakers’ sincere intent with this movie, but it may have been better structured as a straightforward documentary.
JOKER
Digital Monday, disc February 10
CUTTING A Japanese curse in the house never works out well
REALITY Zara Webb, left, plays British teenager Noor