RETURN TO SENDER

In which Rosumund Pike (GONE GIRL) plays a nurse who is raped in her house by a man (Shiloh Fernandez) who she thinks is her blind date. To the incomprehensibility of her father (Nick Nolte) she befriends this man in prison and even asks him to make amends by renovating her now unsaleable house. The twist at the end is straight out a Japanese ultra-violent revenge flick. The problem with this movie is that it’s filmed like a Hallmark Channel afternoon movie and paced with similar banality. It’s very much a workmanlike, obvious, sunlit movie. Rosamund Pike is just fine but it feels like the script isn’t giving her anything to do. We painfully and mechanically wind our way toward a very underplayed twist in the tale which isn’t really worth the candle. Revenge flicks can be done better - the plots don’t need to be any more complex. Just think how David Fincher transformed GONE GIRL into something truly creepy and brilliantly off the hook. If only the film had had the self-confidence to go big, or director Fouad Makiti (OPERATION: ENDGAME) and the cinematographer (can't find the credit on IMDBPro) had had the inspiration to do something edgy and tense with the visuals.

RETURN TO SENDER has a running time of 95 minutes. It is rated 18 for scenes of sexual violence.  It is currently on very limited release in the UK but is also available on demand.

SORORITY ROW - cinematic pot noodle

SORORITY ROW is cheap and nasty. Still, once in a while, typically after a few drinks when there's nothing else in the house and you need to carb up, it's just what you need. It is, in short, a guilty pleasure.

So when I tell you that I had a surprisingly good time watching SORORITY ROW, you'll see where I'm coming from. This movie is pure trash - full of gratuitous tit shots; a risible plot; unscary scary scenes.... It's a slasher movie so bad, it has to be deliberate. But, in the spirit of honesty, it's only fare to 'fess up and say that I laughed hard and long watching SORORITY ROW and positively bounced out of the cinema. And no, before you ask, it had nothing to do with the large gin and tonic at The Imperial beforehand.

The plot is simple. At the start of the university year, a practical joke goes badly wrong and a bunch of sorority sisters hush up the death of their friend, dumping her body rather than call in the cops and getting bounced out of school. Fast forward to graduation day and someone is killing anyone who knows the secret. Is Megan back from the dead? Is her little sister seeking vengeance?

Production values are pretty decent. Indeed, there's an impressive tracking shot that takes us through the sorority house during the opening night party. The acting is also fairly decent, given how hard it is to say so-bad-it's-good lines with a straight face. Perhaps most surprising is that Rumer Willis (daughter of Bruce and Demi) is fine - although she pretty much only has to whimper for the whole film. Best of all, we have Carrie Fisher in a cameo as the House Mother in full on psycho-bitch mode. Genius. As you can imagine, it's the willingness of the movie to spoof its own target demographic that makes it a success. Basically, it's an exercise in depicting - nay lavishing in - the Daily Express' vision of hell: promiscuous teenagers, high on booze and drugs, with too much money, too few scruples, and high-speed internet connections.

We've seen the future, and it's wearing a crystal lip-gloss, a mini-dress, and driving daddy's Porsche Cayenne over a troublesome ex-.

SORORITY ROW is on release in the UK, Australia, Canada and the USA. It opens in two weeks time in Brazil. It opens on October 8th in the Czech Republic and Singapore; October 15th in Argentina; October 22nd in the Netherlands and Venezuela; November 5th in Russia; and November 19th in Portugal.

THE HOUSE BUNNY - dazed and confused

Anna Faris is a very likeable and talented comedienne and it's great to see her get a truly starring role in the teen comedy THE HOUSE BUNNY. What a shame it is, then, to see her given such a weak and confused script. Worse still, because this movie is written by the team that brought us LEGALLY BLONDE. The LB movies managed to skillfully balance their love for seeing chicks in bikinis acting like ditzes with an empowerment message. But THE HOUSE BUNNY fails miserably.

The plot sees Elle, sorry, Shelley, tricked into leaving her idea of heaven - the Playboy Mansion. In her search for a feeling of community she becomes a Sorority Mother to the geekiest, most tragic girls on campus. She gives them an extreme makeover and before you know it, their sorority has become super-popular. Meanwhile, Shelley undergoes the reverse transformation, reading up so that she can impress do-gooding potential boyfriend Oliver. The final message of the film is very confused. On the one hand, you should act sexy because boys like to see skin and don't like brains. But then again, you should respect individuality and intellect. Sitting on the fence like that must've been really painful.

I think LEGALLY BLONDE worked because Elle was seeking acceptance on her own terms: she wasn't trying to convert the masses to her ditzy ways. Moreover, the supporting characters were all fairly normal. But in THE HOUSE BUNNY their is no anchor anywhere near reality. Most of the girls in the sorority are freaks - blunt piss-takes with no more subtelty than Cletus the Slack-Jawed Yokel. All of which makes this no better than a weak LB rip-off with a confused message, too few belly-laughs and amateurish direction.

THE HOUSE BUNNY was released earlier this year in the US, Canada and Australia. It is currently on release in Singapore, Venezuela, France, Germany, Portugal, Russia, Brazil, Iceland and the UK. It opens next week in Egypt and on October 29th in the Philippines. It opens in Finland and Sweden on November 28th and in Belgium, Argentina, the Netherlands and Spain on December 17th. It opens in Denmark on January 9th.