I had high hopes for this one. It’s a British movie, set on an estate and on Halloween. The estate is called the Hallows and the movie centers on a gang living there that generally make peoples lives miserable. Someone has been going round tagging the walls with graffiti with “Beware” and other messages saying that the estate will be taken over on Halloween. The gang obviously think it’s another gang. When Halloween comes, one by one members of the gang disappear and shadowy figures with sacks on their heads are seen wielding baseball bats. One of the gang members, Darren has a sister, who has escaped to go to university and she’s back for the evening, unfortunately she gets abducted too.
Let’s start with the dialogue….I don’t think any gang members refer to the police as “the fuzz” anymore. It made me cringe. The acting made me cringe. The gang was pretty pathetic all round. How do you know you? You ask, you’re a librarian. Yes, indeed. I work in the center of Grimsby. We have many gangs, much bigger gangs than this motley crew and lots scarier.
The movie was obviously on a budget which they spent on potato sacks, baseball bats and pumpkins. Oh, there was a drug death where the girl spewed a porridge type substance. Dammit, we cried they said inject her with opiates not oatmeal! (we found it funny btw that’s our joke not the movies. They can’t have credit for it).
As nobody cared about the characters including their parents, the audience or anybody, there wasn’t the build up of drama. Instead it was a waiting game. There was a vague feeling of unfairness that the sister got caught up because at least she tried to better herself.
The ending was depressing and expected. There was some empathy there on why it happened but that’s it really. I wouldn’t recommend this movie. Disappointing. 3/10 from me. I mean give it a go, there are better reviews on Amazon but I think they watched a different film.
Once Upon The Wytching Hour 