Elfie Hopkins (15)
Starring: Ray Winstone, Jaime Winstone
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Your support makes all the difference.While you don't doubt the sincerity of Welshman Ryan Andrews' aim to create "patient, classic storytelling" in his debut feature, the reality falls hopelessly short.
Nor will admiring references to Chinatown lend it any heft as homegrown noir. Jaime Winstone plays Elfie, a sulky would-be gumshoe whose idea of "working a case" is to smoke dope, stare out of a conveniently situated window and mutter into a voice recorder.
The arrival of a new family in her remote Welsh village coincides with the sudden disappearance of neighbours supposedly bound on a "bespoke" holiday. Only Elfie and nerdy mate Dylan (Aneurin Barnard) smell a rat. It starts out like a Children's Film Foundation mystery before degenerating into a weird slasher comedy with cannibalism on the side. Ray Winstone as a random butcher brings cachet but not credibility to an under-rehearsed, unfocused, ill-written mess.
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