THE ORPHANAGE (15) £19.99
Director: Juan Antonio Bayona
Running time: 102 minutesIf the fact that Guillermo Del Toro (the director of the wonderful Pan's Labyrinth) produced this Spanish haunted house thriller isn't enou
gh to tempt you to see it, chances are the synopsis won't. Laura (Belén Rueda), a wife and mother, returns to the disused orphanage where she was raised in the hope of turning it into a home for children with learning disabilities. Predictably, things start to get a bit spooky as ghosts from Laura's past come back to haunt her, while her son, Simón, meets a new group of imaginary friends and goes missing. The premise may reek of unoriginality, but surprisingly, this is a very impressive debut feature for director Juan Antonio Bayona, who manages to send a chill down the viewer's spine without making the film feel like just another Hollywood fright fest.
ALL THE BOYS LOVE MANDY LANE (18) £17.99
Director: Jonathan Levine
Running time: 90 minutesThis American teen slasher is like 'She's All That' meets 'The Texas Chainsaw Massacre', with less appeal.
Amber Heard plays Mandy Lane, a beautiful blonde virgin who has all the boys drooling, including Dylan, who jumps off a roof at a pool party in a bid to impress her (because that's how all girls like to be wooed, right?), and ends up killing himself – oops.
Nine months later, Mandy and her bunch of misfit admirers decide to go for a break in a secluded Texan ranch for a weekend of sex, drugs, peer pressure and butchering. It's gorey, voyeuristic and contrived, as you would expect, and my guess is that only fans of the genre will find anything in it to shout about.
The full article contains 294 words and appears in Scotland On Sunday newspaper.
