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Run (2020)

This is a masterclass in how not to construct a thriller, with plot holes you could drive a fleet of plot trucks through.

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Run 2020

In a cinematic landscape where suspension of disbelief is often the price of admission, the 2020 thriller “Run” demands not just suspension but outright catapulting of disbelief into the stratosphere. Directed by Aneesh Chaganty, this film attempts to weave a tale of suspense and maternal manipulation but ends up serving a hodgepodge of plot holes so large, you could pilot the Starship Enterprise through them.

First off, let’s address the elephant in the room – or rather, the completely ignored elephant stampede. Our protagonist, Chloe, portrayed with commendable effort by Kiera Allen, somehow manages to overlook the glaringly obvious fact that her mother, played by Sarah Paulson with the subtlety of a neon sign in a monastery, is up to no good. The villainy is so over-played I half expected Sarah to be stood in a corner at one point, twirling a mustache between her fingers. The audience is expected to believe that Chloe, despite being a tech-savvy teenager, never once Googles her own medical condition until the plot decides it’s convenient for her to do so.

Then there’s the matter of the mysteriously replenishing stock of dangerous drugs and medical equipment in their house. The mother, Diane, seems to have an Amazon Prime account with unlimited next-day delivery to the middle of Nowheresville, USA, for all her illicit pharmaceutical needs. It’s as if the filmmakers expect us to believe that every suburban home comes equipped with a fully stocked pharmacy hidden behind the kitchen cabinets, just between the cereal boxes and the canned soup.

One of the drugs, which is solely to blame for Chloe’s legs, was prescribed under the pretense that Diane has a dog which is in pain… but we’re also led to believe that Chloe has been taking these drugs for years. So nobody questions where Diane’s dog is? Has there even been a dog? Nobody mentions never seeing Diane with a dog? How long has this dog supposedly been in pain for? Is it the same dog over all these years?

At one point, the film shows Diane in the shower with a scarred back – this also never gets explained (eventually I found that there’s a deleted scene which gives a very throwaway explanation about it – she’s also a child of abuse).

While I’m at it, what happens to the postman? We know Diane knocks him out but is he alive or dead? We see Diane dragging a bloodied body away but did she actually finish him off or not?

Oh, and why did Chloe go through the whole process of taking a soldering kit to ultimately break a window? It’s like the film just needed an excuse to remind us that Chloe is, in fact, a rather clever girl… So clever she doesn’t think to just use the handle of the soldering kit to break a window instead of a stupid science experiment.

Moreover, the world around Chloe and Diane seems eerily devoid of curiosity or concern from others. This lack of outside interaction or intervention is perhaps one of the film’s most glaring omissions. In an era where community and connectivity are more pronounced than ever, the film’s insular setting feels less like a deliberate choice and more like a narrative oversight, making the story’s progression feel not just improbable but impossible.

“Run” takes the concept of a helicopter parent to new, absurd heights, with Diane’s overprotectiveness bordering on supervillainy. The film tries to keep you on the edge of your seat but instead leaves you falling off it, laughing at the ludicrous lengths to which it goes to manufacture tension. By the time the climax rolls around, with its attempt at a heart-pounding resolution, the only thing racing will be your thoughts on how such a hilariously hole-ridden plot made it past the drawing board.

This is a masterclass in how not to construct a thriller, with plot holes you could drive a fleet of plot trucks through. It’s a rollercoaster ride that derails before it even leaves the station, providing a comedy of errors that’s unintentionally funnier than most deliberate attempts at humor. One can only hope that future filmmakers will run – not walk – in the opposite direction when drawing inspiration from this cinematic curiosity.

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Films

Sinners (2025)

It’s fine, I suppose, but I don’t understand why everyone’s acting like it’s the greatest thing since sliced bread when it’s really more like adequately buttered toast.

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Sinners (2025)

Sinners is a perfectly adequate film – but that’s it, adequate.

It’s not completely shit. The acting is perfectly fine – nobody embarrasses themselves, nobody phones it in. Michael B. Jordan does his thing, everyone else does their thing, and things generally get done adequately. The music is surprisingly decent too, which is more than you can say for most films these days, where the soundtrack sounds like it was composed by someone having a nervous breakdown in a synthesiser shop.

But bloody hell, this thing is about 30 minutes too long. Maybe more. It’s like watching someone tell a perfectly good joke and then spend another half hour explaining why it was funny, complete with PowerPoint slides and audience participation segments.

You can feel where a decent 90-minute film is trying to escape from the bloated 2-hour monster it’s been trapped inside. The first 45 minutes is all set-up. Every scene goes on just a bit too long, every conversation includes about three more exchanges than necessary, and by the end you’re checking your watch wondering if time has actually stopped moving.

But there were three things in particular that bugged me about this film.

First up, we’ve got the classic “one person does something monumentally stupid that puts everyone at risk” scenario. In this case, someone invites the vampires in, because apparently nobody in this film has ever seen a vampire movie before. It’s like watching someone stick their hand in a blender and then acting surprised when it doesn’t end well.

Then there’s the antagonist, who spends precious time delivering what amounts to a TED talk about his evil plans instead of just getting on with the evil bit. Look mate, we get it, you’re the bad guy, you’ve got motivations and backstory and probably daddy issues. Just get on with the murdering, yeah? The monologuing thing stopped being clever sometime around the first Austin Powers film.

But here’s the really mental bit – even without all the villainous chat, the plan still makes no bloody sense. He’s going to burn anyway? What was the strategy there exactly? Stand around explaining things until sunrise? It’s like watching someone play chess by explaining their moves to their opponent for twenty minutes before actually making them.

The whole thing follows the “everyone gets laid and dies” formula with the reliability of a Swiss watch. You can practically tick them off: character development, bit of romance, sexy times, immediate death. It’s so predictable you could set your calendar by it.

The setting and costumes are fine enough – period pieces generally look good because someone’s put effort into making sure the buttons are historically accurate and the dirt is appropriately distributed. But looking nice isn’t the same as being interesting, which seems to be something this film hasn’t quite grasped.

What’s most frustrating is that there’s clearly a decent film buried somewhere in this overstretched mess. Strip away the padding, tighten up the pacing, maybe don’t have your villain explain his entire life story before getting down to business, and you might have something actually worth watching.

Instead, we get a film that’s been hyped to the bloody moon by people who seem to think “adequate” is the new “brilliant.” Everyone’s acting like this is some kind of game-changing masterpiece, when it’s really just a perfectly serviceable vampire film that’s been inflated like a balloon at a children’s party.

The hype is the real problem here. When everyone’s telling you something is revolutionary cinema, you go in expecting your socks to be knocked clean off. Instead, your socks remain firmly in place, possibly even more securely attached than when you started.

Look, if you go in with properly managed expectations – thinking you’re going to see a decent enough vampire film with good production values and competent performances – you’ll probably have a perfectly acceptable time. If you go in expecting the sort of groundbreaking cinema everyone’s been promising, you’re going to come out wondering what all the fuss was about.

It’s fine, I suppose, but I don’t understand why everyone’s acting like it’s the greatest thing since sliced bread when it’s really more like adequately buttered toast.

Sinners (2025)
3.5 ScreenDim Score

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Films

Bring Her Back (2025)

“Bring Her Back” is like a horror film that’s been assembled from really good individual scenes without anyone checking whether they actually fit together into a coherent whole.

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Bring Her Back

This horror film has more unexplained mysteries than a David Lynch fever dream, but at least the gore is properly mental.

SPOILER WARNING: Loads of spoilers here.

Don’t get me wrong – this isn’t complete shite. The gore is properly brutal, the kind that makes you wince and immediately check that all your limbs are still attached. The performances are genuinely solid across the board. And Laura, the main antagonist, is the sort of character you absolutely love to hate, like a particularly effective parking warden or someone who talks loudly on their phone in quiet train carriages.

But Christ alive, the story makes about as much sense as a chocolate teapot in a sauna.

Laura apparently kidnaps Oliver from his bedroom, according to a missing poster. Now, I’m no expert on child abduction, but last time I checked, scaling buildings and making off with random children isn’t exactly a beginner-level criminal activity. Did she just happen to have a ladder handy? Cat burglar training? A very understanding Uber driver? The film doesn’t bother explaining how someone manages to nick a kid from what we can assume is a family home without anyone noticing.

And speaking of Oliver – or Connor, or whatever his name is this week – how exactly did he get possessed in the first place? Did the demon put in an application? Was there an interview process? A background check? The film treats demonic possession like it’s as common as catching a cold, but never bothers explaining how any of this supernatural bollocks actually works.

Then there’s the question of whether Laura actually murdered Andy and Piper’s dad, or if that was just convenient manipulation. Because if she did kill him, that raises a whole other set of questions about her murder methodology. If she didn’t, then what are the odds she’d randomly acquire a kid who happens to be both female and partially blind? That’s not luck, that’s winning the evil plot lottery.

And where the hell are all the mothers? Andy’s mother – no idea what happened to her. Piper’s mum – no idea what happened to her. We find out Andy’s dad is a bit of a dick so are we meant to assume he was abusive to both mothers and they both leave without the kids? What the hell happened there?

The more you think about the logistics of what’s supposed to have happened, the more your brain starts to hurt. It’s like trying to solve a jigsaw puzzle where half the pieces are missing and the other half are from a completely different box.

But here’s the thing – when the film stops trying to make sense and just gets on with being properly horrific, it actually works quite well. The knife scene is absolutely brutal, the kind of thing that makes you grateful you’re watching it on a screen rather than having to clean up afterwards. The table eating scene is similarly mental – properly disturbing in all the right ways.

And the actors – fair play to them – they sell the hell out of this confused narrative. They’re committed to making this mess feel real, even when the plot is doing backflips to avoid explaining itself. Laura, in particular, is brilliantly hateable. She’s the sort of antagonist who makes you genuinely invested in seeing her get her comeuppance, which is no small achievement when you’re working with material that’s held together with narrative duct tape.

“Bring Her Back” is like a horror film that’s been assembled from really good individual scenes without anyone checking whether they actually fit together into a coherent whole. It’s got all the right ingredients – decent acting, proper gore, genuinely creepy moments – but it’s been mixed together by someone who’s apparently never heard of things like “logic” or “cause and effect.”

Review 0
4 ScreenDim Score

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Smile 2 (2024)

Still better than most horror sequels, mind you. But that’s like being the tallest person in a room full of sitting people – technically accurate, but not exactly a ringing endorsement.

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Smile 2

Yes, I’m late to the party on this one.

The story follows a pop star who gets infected by the smile curse, which sounds like it should be a tabloid headline but is apparently a legitimate supernatural threat. Naomi Scott does a perfectly decent job as someone slowly losing her mind to demonic grinning, and to be fair, she sells the hell out of the increasingly unhinged behaviour. The supporting cast all do their jobs competently enough – nobody embarrasses themselves, nobody phones it in.

But here’s where it all goes tits up: the film spends most of its runtime building up tension, creating genuinely unsettling scenarios, and making you invested in what’s happening to these characters. Then, just when you think you’re getting somewhere, it pulls the old “actually, the last thirty minutes were all in her head because demons” trick.

It’s the horror equivalent of those dreams where you think you’ve woken up but you’re still dreaming, except instead of being clever, it’s just bloody annoying. You know what’s not scary? Being told that the scary thing you just watched wasn’t real. You know what doesn’t create tension? Undermining your own narrative with the supernatural equivalent of “it was all a dream.”

This isn’t innovative storytelling; it’s lazy writing disguised as psychological complexity. It’s what happens when writers can’t figure out how to resolve their plot properly so they just declare that half of it didn’t actually happen. It’s like playing chess with someone who keeps moving the pieces and then claiming the rules were different all along.

The gore is adequate enough – nothing that’ll make you lose your lunch, but sufficient to remind you that you’re watching a horror film and not an episode of “Holby City” with occasional grinning. There are some properly unsettling moments scattered throughout, particularly a sequence where smiling people materialise in the protagonist’s flat and only move when she’s not looking directly at them. It’s properly creepy, like having the world’s most sinister game of Red Light, Green Light happening in your living room.

That bit actually works brilliantly – it’s the kind of nightmare logic that makes you genuinely uncomfortable without resorting to cheap jump scares or explaining itself to death. More of that, please, and less of the “surprise, none of this mattered” bollocks.

But then we need to talk about the product placement, because bloody hell, someone at Voss Water must have pictures of the filmmakers doing something embarrassing. I counted the distinctive bottles appearing on screen at least eight times, which is approximately seven more times than necessary to establish that people in this film drink water. It’s so blatant it becomes genuinely distracting – you start watching for the next Voss bottle appearance instead of paying attention to the actual horror.

It’s like they’ve confused a horror film with a particularly expensive advert for overpriced bottled water. Every time someone needs to hydrate, out comes another perfectly positioned Voss bottle, gleaming in the light like some kind of Norwegian beacon of commercial desperation. You half expect the demon to start grinning because it’s just remembered to stay properly hydrated.

I understand that films need financing, and product placement is part of modern cinema. But there’s a difference between subtle brand integration and basically turning your horror film into a pop-up shop for premium water. When your supernatural thriller starts feeling like a lifestyle magazine, you’ve probably gone too far.

If you enjoyed the first “Smile,” you’ll probably find this tolerable enough. If you were hoping for something that built meaningfully on the original concept rather than just repeating it with better production values and more water bottle cameos, you might come away feeling like you’ve been sold a slightly more expensive version of something you already owned.

Still better than most horror sequels, mind you. But that’s like being the tallest person in a room full of sitting people – technically accurate, but not exactly a ringing endorsement.

Smile 2 (2024)
3.5 ScreenDim Score

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