British Film Institute - London Film Festival

Film

What's on at the cinema plus reviews of the latest movie and DVD releases

Search cinema listings

Browse cinemas A-Z

Search 20,000 reviews

 

Dead Babies (2000)

Director: William Marsh

Average user rating
No reviews

Movie review

From Time Out Film Guide

Long before Martin Amis' mid-'70s novel reached the screen, the shock value masking a country house whodunit in the Agatha Christie mould was already dated. Admittedly, there's rather more sexual and chemical mayhem, but the basic outline provides assorted English toffs, sundry visiting Yanks, and a mystery assailant in their midst. Writer/director Marsh's update on the material to a post-millennial near-future adds the Conceptualists, an anarchic terror group who advertise their atrocities on the Web, and whose deadly graffiti signature, 'Johnny', signals imminent danger for the drug-fuelled revellers at Appleseed Rectory. If 'Johnny' doesn't get them first, acid guru Marvel's pharmaceutical cocktails just might pitch them all over the edge. Presumably there's a satirical intent: the path of youthful excess leading not to freewheeling hedonism but further psychological turmoil. Yet the film hardly encourages us to engage with its woolly debate on how we pursue our freedoms when it's so gruellingly tiresome to sit through.

Author: TJ

Time Out Film Guide


  • Print this page
  • Send to a friend

What do you think?
Post your review now

clear rating
Min 1 star. Zero stars will be treated as unrated.

*mandatory fields





Top Stories

A Bond a day: No.7 'Diamonds Are Forever'

A Bond a day: No.7 'Diamonds Are Forever'

Join Time Out as we revisit the 21 official James Bond movies to celebrate the release of 'Quantum of Solace'

Steve McQueen on 'Hunger'

Steve McQueen on 'Hunger'

Dave Calhoun meets artist Steve McQueen’s whose debut feature film, ‘Hunger’, is the story of IRA hunger striker Bobby Sands

Producer Stephen Woolley on ‘How to Lose Friends and Alienate People’

Producer Stephen Woolley on ‘How to Lose Friends and Alienate People’

Stephen Woolley, recalls the near catastrophes he had to contend with in bringing Toby Young’s memoir to the screen

Paul Newman: 1925 – 2008

Paul Newman: 1925 – 2008

Paul Newman died at his Connecticut home this weekend, at the age of 83. We look back at one of the great movie careers of the twentieth century

Richard Attenborough: interview

Richard Attenborough: interview

‘Entirely Up to You, Darling’ is the long-awaited autobiography from Sir Richard Attenborough. David Jenkins meets him in his Richmond home

Hard hacks to follow

Hard hacks to follow

To celebrate the release of 'How To Lose Friends and Alienate People', Time Out pick some of the toughest journalistic gigs in cinema