Red Sparrow is a 2018 spy-thriller film directed by Francis Lawrence who worked with Jennifer Lawrence (the star here) on a couple of the Hunger Games movies, but this is a very different beast. Jennifer Lawrence plays Dominika Egorova (in, it has to be said, a not entirely convincing Russian accent), and Joel Edgerton, Matthias Schoenarts and Charlotte Rampling star as the film's secondary characters. This one is a pretty big departure from what Lawrence has done in the past, although it has to be said that she's making some pretty bold career choices. I'm not the first one to say that, and for a good reason: it's true. After last year's Mother! it appeared as if she was trying purposefully trying to appear in more "mature" films, and believe me, it doesn't get much more mature than Red Sparrow. The film plays out like one of those schlocky exploitation from the seventies, in that there's sexual violence, sex, violence, torture, and all manner o
Little Evil is a 2017 horror comedy written and directed by Eli Craig. It stars Adam Scott and Evangeline Lilly as a newly-married couple. Evangeline Lilly's character, Samantha, has a child for reasons the audience finds out later, and it falls to Adam Scott's character Gary Bloom to connect with him and be a good father. However, to his dismay, Lucas (the child) turns out to be something very different to what he originally seemed.
I enjoyed this film quite a bit. It's very fast-paced and there are a lot of jokes in most scenes. The thing I liked most about Little Evil is that it's incredibly cine-literate. There are references to The Shining, Poltergeist, The Omen and various other horror films, and long-time fans of the genre will find a lot to enjoy here. This is something I sort of take issue with, because I can't tell if it's a homage or something which was copied, but the editing in parts is very similar to Edgar Wright's Cornetto Trilogy. People familiar with those films will know what I mean, but the editing is very stylish and streamlined to make Little Evil a more fast-paced experience. As far as the film references go, that's a pretty minor point though. Most of them work.
The thing I like the most about this film (and this is usually what turns films from generic into something with replay value) is that there's a thematic reason for all of the stuff that happens. Of course, on the surface Little Evil is a film about an evil child which needs to be defeated somehow, but under the surface it's a story about a man trying to win over his step-son and pull a family together. On top of that, each member of the family is written with a surprising amount of depth, which is refreshing.
The only downside to this film is that the third act of the film does go off the rails slightly, in terms of the narrative. But the story moves quickly, and you care about the characters enough for it to remain engaging when the story moves into ridiculous territory, even for a horror-comedy. So, it's a fast, funny, affecting, consistently entertaining film, and I think it's a film that will appeal to a wider audience than the Netflix marketing team gives it credit for.
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