CHRISTMAS LEFTOVERS - FESTIVE FRIGHTS # 3 - THE CHILDREN (2008)

 DIRECTED & WRITTEN by TOM SHANKLAND

STARRING  - Hannah Tointon as Casey,  Eva Birthistle as Elaine,  Stephen Campbell Moore as Jonah,  Eva Sayer as Miranda,  William Howes as Paulie,  Rachel Shelley as Chloe,  Jeremy Sheffield as Robbie,  Rafiella Brookes as Leah,  Jake Hathaway as Nicky.

PLOT -  Middle-Class couple Elaine and Jonah along with thier children - Miranda and Paulie, and Elaine's rebellious teenage daughter Casey go to spend New Year's Eve with Elaine's sister Chloe and her husband Robbie and two kids - Nicky and Leah - in thier countryside farmhouse home.

At first all seems normal enough - the adults eat, drink and be merry, the children play and squabble whilst Casey feels bored and isolated (being a teenager she has little in common with either the adults or the children). Eventually one by one the children begin to fall ill with a sickness, at first the adults assume it to be nothing more than a winter stomach bug but they're wrong...dead wrong.

The children begin to show signs of violent behaviour and very soon they embark on a murderous rampage. One by one the adults are killed and soon only Casey and her injured mother remain alive...but for how long ? And is this just an isolated incident or has the strange contagion spread further?...

DIALOUGE  - Casey - "Did you ever hear of contraception ?"

PERFORMANCES  - Hannah Tointon plays Casey who is pretty much the main character in this British fright flick. Casey is your typical bored teenager at first - she hates being stuck with her family on New Year's Eve in the middle of nowhere and is in a bad mood because she can't go to a party with her friends that night. She seems set on causing a bit of mischief or outrage to liven up the tedious family social gathering. She flirts heavily with her uncle Robbie (Jeremy Sheffield) who - inappropriately - flirts back. This behaviour doesn't go unnoticed by Chloe (Rachel Shelley) who quite understandably doesn't approve of a teenager - her niece no less - acting seductively towards her husband. The resulting family tension drives the story and characters before the children start acting like little psychopaths and remains simmering under the surface even whilst the main thrust of the story kicks in.

Tointon is very good in this role, the character is not massively likeable (in fact the entire dysfunctional family are all generally pretty odious) but you can at least understand why she's acting up - she's bored and hormonal (the rest of the so-called adults don't have even that excuse). As the story progresses and the stakes are raised Casey becomes increasingly terrified and desperate but also determined to survive. Tointon does terrified REALLY well, she's also pretty convincing at being badass and has no problem with carrying out acts of extreme violence upon small psychotic children. By the end of the film its implied that Casey too has been infected by whatever virus has turned the children feral but it is neither confirmed or denied - the audience is left to make up thier own minds.

The rest of the family are - as I've said - a pretty terrible bunch of people. All very well acted but bloody horrible characters all the same. For example theres Jonah (Stephen Campbell Moore) - Casey's stepdad who also happens to be a 30-something hipster businessman. The type of man who takes his family on holiday and then does nothing except talk business when he should be enjoying quality time with his wife and kids. He's also shown to be both a control freak and a coward - at one point he abandons his own wife to save his own skin.

Then we get pervy uncle Robbie (Jeremy Sheffield) who has absolutely no problem with his teenage niece coming onto him - "You don't have to call me 'uncle' " he says at one point which is a real red-flag moment if ever I saw one. The man's the type of sleazebag you could easily imagine grooming teenagers on the Internet.

Robbie's wife Chloe (Rachel Shelley) comes over as completely false and shallow and - perhaps understandble given her husband's dodgy behaviour - increasingly paranoid and hysterical.

The only adult that comes out of this as being remotely likeable is Elaine (Eva Birthistle). Her only crime really is to be a bit of a push-over in the face of her obnoxious husband's overbearing personality. Overall this family is one of the most unlikeable bunch of people ever committed to film - even when they're not tearing strips off each other they come over as being really smug and entitled. Even the little kids are horrible spoilt brats - and that's BEFORE they become ultra-violent psycho-killers. All this is completely intentional of course - we're SUPPOSED to hate these obnoxious characters and root for them to die horribly - thankfully this film doesn't disappoint on that score.

SFX - Lots of practical blood and gore effects. The visual device of red blood on white snow is used in this movie A LOT.

VIOLENCE  - "Uncle" Robbie gets his head split open with a conveniently placed garden rake whilst sledging. He leaks blood and brains all over the snow, his body is then dragged off by the kids where they use his ripped open stomach to store toy dolls.

Elaine -graphically- breaks her leg after being pushed backwards off an icy climbing frame by her son Paulie. Casey then evens the odds by stabbing her little brother to death with a shard of glass.

Chloe gets her earlobe ripped off and then stabbed through the eye with a pencil crayon by her own daughter...

Little psycho Nicky is skewered through the throat from a piece of wood on a broken door...again by Casey (you GO girl !!!!)

Business twat Jonah is killed offscreen in a car crash caused by his own daughter - we get to see his corpse but it's a pity because I really REALLY wanted to see this character get it.

And finally - and perhaps most brutally - Daddy's little princess and cat killing nutter Miranda is crushed to death between two cars by her own Mum (Elaine), her little blonde head hits the back window of the car she's propelled into and splits open like a watermelon...to think all she wanted for Christmas was a Pony - instead she gets this.

RATING  - The Children is a great little slice of festive mayhem. It won't be to everybodys taste as I'm sure many, many people will find scenes of small children being graphically killed in almost comic-book style to be massively disturbing...but surely that's the whole point of horror - to make it's audience feel uncomfortable ?

Personally, I think it's all done in such an OTT manner that you can't take it remotely seriously. At points it almost comes across as a bit of a black comedy/satire about the nature of white Middle-Class British family life. Viewed through that lens any potential offensiveness is quickly driven away and it becomes an enjoyable viewing experience.

This one's getting 5 creepy killer kids out of 5. DEFINITELY watch this.

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