Susan Granger’s review of “Innocence” (Killer Films/John Wells Productions/Scion Pictures)
Writer/director Hilary Brougher’s heavy-handed adaptation of Jane Mendelsohn’s 2001 Young Adult novel is a ploddingly paced, utterly ridiculous supernatural saga.
Teenage Beckett (Sophie Curtis) is the beleaguered heroine who she suffers one nightmare after another. First, she’s forced to move to Manhattan when her mother drowns in a surfing accident off Montauk. Then, when her dad, renowned author Miles Warner (Linus Roache), enrolls her in a prestigious Riverdale prep school, a classmate named Sunday (Chloe Levine) suddenly commits suicide by jumping off a building, landing on the pavement right in front of her. According to school’s pill-pushing psychiatrist (Sarita Choudhury), Beckett is traumatized but, before long, it gets a lot worse. That’s because Beckett discovers that the creepily striking faculty and alumnae have formed a strange cabal to prey on virginal students, ritually drinking their blood to stay young and beautiful. Sexy Pamela Hamilton (Kelly Reilly), the school nurse, is the most predatory, quickly moving in on Beckett’s dad – both figuratively and literally. Fortunately, Beckett has a couple of adolescent friends in whom she can confide – like rebellious Jen (Sarah Sutherland, Kiefer’s daughter) and Tobey (Graham Phillips), who teaches her how to skate-board. In some bizarre way, this melodramatic Gothic stupidity ties in with Lamia, the queen of Libya who – in ancient Greek mythology – became a child-devouring demon.
It’s particularly disappointing having come from Hilary Brougher, who made the excellent high-school pregnancy drama “Stephanie Daley” (2006) and obviously knows how to handle adolescent angst. Director Brougher apparently co-wrote the script with Tristine Skyler.
On the Granger Movie Gauge of 1 to 10, “Innocence” is a tiresome, incoherent 2. Don’t bother.
