Dead Babies

Having been an avid Martin Amis fan for many years I was understandably excited when this film came out. Although I never caught it at the cinema, indeed, I didn't know it existed until it was on television two or so years ago.

The most important aspects of a film adaptation are present: the characters stayed true to those in the book, no vital points were missed out and the director took the same perspective on life and the book as Amis did.

If the Marquis de Sade were to crash one of P. G. Wodehouse's house parties, the chaos might resemble the nightmarishly funny goings-on in this film. The residents of Appleseed Rectory have primed themselves both for a visit from a triad of Americans and a weekend of copious drug taking and sexual gymnastics. There's even a heifer to be slugged. But none of these variously bright and dull young things has counted on the intrusion of "dead babies". Or on the uninvited presence of a mysterious prankster named Johnny, whose sinister idea of fun makes theirs look like a game of backgammon

I fear the author of the previous review assumed that this film would be a cheap horror, as I'm sure many people have owing to the somewhat dubious title. However, the term 'dead babies' was used in the book to mean 'dreary spasms of reality', the unpleasant facts of life that invariably must be dealt with sooner or later, and thus I can use this review as a platform to ward away hammer horror fans.

Instead rent or buy this movie if you want an ingenious dark comedy with a kick. I loved it!

A couple of days after writing about how garbage like MAD COWS and THIS FILTHY EARTH receive money while Ange , Duncan and Theo are totally ignored I had to sit through yet another British movie * that had me scratching my head as to why it received a single penny . Some people may claim that because DEAD BABIES is based upon a highly regarded novel it has an in built market but both THIS FILTHY EARTH and MAD COWS were also adapted from novels and they were an ordeal to sit through as well

I had read the synopsis of the plot where a bunch of high class wasters go to a remote mansion where they're stalked by an internet cult but to be honest this isn't really how the story unravels and anyone expecting Friday THE 13TH meets THE SHINING is going to be bitterly disappointed since 90-95% of the running time is taken up with said characters taking drugs and discussing sex . And what hateful characters they are too . Not one of them is likable in any way and within minutes you'll be getting nostalgic for Stalin , Mao and Pol Pot hoping that next time someone embarks on communist democide they'll be successful in creating an egalitarian utopia . Anything that will signal the end of such decadent bourgeois meaningless that the hateful characters in this movie embark upon can only be welcomed

Not content with giving us a movie where the plot is meandering and where the audience fail to connect with the characters the director continues to spoil things further by getting all clever and arty . No doubt that is to impress us so we will fall upon our knees and cry " Oh my god , what a wonderful director the way he bamboozles us with his highly artistic technique and only a worthless pleb will fail to appreciate what a god given talent this man is " . I'm sure the vast majority of people either screamed " How come my projects got turned down while crap like this didn't ? " or " WTF was the last half hour of this piece of crap all about ? " You might defend the movie by saying the original source novel was unfilmable and this makes the film unwatchable . I will agree that this movie is unwatchable

* I know the IMDb classes this as an American movie but the style and faults with DEAD BABIES is uniquely British . Americans might think they've got things tough with Bush but we've got Tony Blair , not to mention DEAD BABIES , MAD COWS and THIS FILTHY EARTH . No wonder everyone is ashamed to be British in the 21st century

It would be true to say that William Marsh's directorial debut pulls no punches. In fact shock tactics are deliberately played right from the word go. One of the first shots is of the alcoholic Giles' bloody teeth falling out one by one. From here on in the audience is left with little doubt that we're in for a bumpy ride. However, we end up being bombarded with so many scenes of drugs, violence, nudity and general depravity that one soon develops an immunity.

The plot centers around one hedonistic weekend where a bunch of directionless English graduates who inhabit a country mansion, are visited by three American friends (one of whom is played by Marsh himself) bent on supplying the perfect weekend of sex and drugs. It's kind of like watching a drugged-up version of Peter's Friends. The films' sub-plot involves a net based terrorist group known as The Conceptualists, who have somehow infiltrated the proceedings. It soon becomes clear that one of the revelers is not what they seem. However any intrigue, or indeed suspense, is dulled by our lack of empathy for the characters, who are either too larger-than-life to be believable or just totally un-likeable.

Dead Babies would no doubt like to be thought of in the same tradition as other drug fueled British cult classics such as Performance, Withnail and I, and Trainspotting. However, these films were far more character driven and weren't so heavily dependent on artificial means of stimulation.

It's possible that you may see this movie on TV. Bear in mind that those two hours of your life can never be brought back. If you see it in a video store, bear in mind that you will be wasting your money AND your life.

This is a badly written, poorly paced and badly shot movie. The characters are nothing you haven't seen before, the sort of badly-characterised 'spoilt rich kid' that appear in all sorts of British movies. The plot - concerning 'internet terrorists' (has Amis been reading a lot of Lynda La Plante lately?) is nothing short of appalling.

Save for a few reasonably good performances, there is absolutely nothing to like about this film. I wouldn't recommend it to anyone.

A terrible storyline (Amis at his worst), pointless and self-conscious 'decadence', obvious shock tactics and patchy acting make this film (rather like "Rancid Aluminium") embody everything that went wrong with the much-vaunted British film revival. The humour is, at best, limp, and the pretentiousness of the whole set-up (including some kind of "internet terrorist group" - ooh, how contemporary) really begins to grate.

Final summary - a half-baked attempt to be 'edgy' that does no-one any favours. Still, it's always a pleasure to see Katy Carmichael on screen...