Let’s Be Evil (2016)
Directed by Martin Owen
Written by Jonathan Willis, Martin Owen, Elizabeth Morris
Produced by Nicki Perkins, Elizabeth Morris, Martin Owen, Weena Wijitkhuankhan, Matt Williams, Harry Willis, Jonathan Willis, Tom Willis, Mario Tafur, Martin Barnes, David Bostock, Vincent Bull, Mark Clenshaw, John Cruse, Pratima Desai, Dave Ellor, Chris Furness, John Harrison, Mike Harrison, Michael Holmes, Trevor Howard, Simon James, Robin Kayser, Jonathan Kendall, Mike Norris, Bill Roberts, David Ronaldson, Amandeep Sandhu, Brandon Smith, Alan Thompson, Carl Welham, Dave Yeates, Laura Yeates
Starring Elizabeth Morris, Kara Tointon, Elliot James Langridge, Isabelle Allen, Natasha Moore, Jamie Bernadette
Synopsis
Three Californian attendants (Morris, Tointon, Langridge) of juvenile prodigies are escorted by a personalized, interactive program (Moore/Bernadette) in an underground level where the entrusted tykes are subjected to exhaustive educational evaluation and lucubration. When these small children revolt, nobody present has the sense or mettle to chasten them.
Script
Exceptionally stupid titles often forecast exceptionally stupid stories, so you’ve been doubly warned. Willis’s “original concept” contained a favorable germ dissipated in Owen’s and Morris’s heinous screenplay. Anyone equipped with flashlights and corporal punishment could squash straightway their silly sedition, but these hellions (and the storyline) rely on adults who childishly panic during emergencies without conferring or compassing — an honest, bothersome depiction of Americans and Britons. “Are you really that stupid?” asks an insurgent gamine of Morris’s minder, as might you during the anteceding hour. Occasionally turgid dialogue unintentionally miswritten in English vernacular is sprinkled with artificial Americanisms. Half of what occurs makes no sense until a conclusive revelation defies prevision by virtue of its lazily fabricated inanity.
Direction
Shot primarily from perspectives of computerized glasses worn by the custodians, Owen’s unsuspenseful devices are as overworked as antiquated farm tools.
Histrionics
Morris emotes with all the passion of bound timber, while Tointon and Langridge nigglingly nip scenery with American accents as audibly inauthentic as their lines. A prefatory interview designating the dehumanization of globalized capitalist imperatives is so abominably acted by Brooke Johnston and James McNeill that’s it’s sure to be savored by schlockmongers.
Flaws
- Old PCs, telephones, filing cabinets, and other appurtenances common to offices in the late 20th century affect no nostalgia as the only interesting articles seen in Melissa Spratt’s dreary production design.
- Late in the third act, scrawny Langridge is subdued and suffocated by a gaggle of tots who are gently prehending his clothes.
- Sinks in the facility’s bathrooms feature dual faucets, which most Columbians haven’t suffered for nearly a century.
- At no time does anyone propose the possibility of self-defense.
Conclusion
A few spineless simpletons couldn’t babysit a dozen chairborne, prepubescent nerds.
Instead, watch Miri (from Star Trek‘s first season), Logan’s Run, or Beyond the Black Rainbow.