Made by an Irish director with Irish funds based on an American Young Adult book series and set in the United States, this curious low-budget thriller, shot on 16mm, has a certain hand-sewn élan.
Max Records (Where The Wild Things Are) plays a teenage loner – John Wayne Cleaver (!) – who, along with his shrink, thinks he may be sociopathic; therefore, he is determined to avoid homicidal thoughts and instincts, lest he become a serial killer (and I thought my teenage angst was bad!). When a series of murders occur in his small town, well, naturally, his curiosity is engaged…
Good ol’ Christopher Lloyd – who, it must be said, is definitely looking old – gently and appealingly plays a local fella who befriends young Cleaver, and Laura Fraser (Lydia from Breaking Bad – did you know she was Scottish?) plays his mum, the town mortician, very well. The whole thing has quite a unique tone – a blend of extremely dry humor, creepy low-key horror, and retro-styled aesthetics – that atone for its somewhat over-extended runtime.
CJ Johnson
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Author: CJ Johnson
CJ Johnson is a radio host and film critic based in Sydney and LA. His radio show and Podcast Movieland is broadcast on the ABC in Australia and free to subscribe to on iTunes. His book And The Oscar Didn’t Go To… is about all the times the Academy screwed it up and gave the Oscar to the wrong person or film. As a critic, picking a genre would be like having a favorite child, but he does fancy a good caper movie. You can now watch his web TV show - http://www.skipi.tv/channel/watch-this/