The first thing that hits you in Billy O\u2019Brien\u2019s adaptation of Dan Wells\u2019 novel is the atmosphere. Dark, cold and rich, this is a wonderful slice of small town gothic that has some real surprises up its sleeve.<\/p>\n
John Wayne Cleaver (Max Records) is a difficult teenager. Diagnosed as sociopathic by his therapist (Karl Geary), he spends his time in school trying to repress his violent urges towards\u00a0the kids who bully him, and at night he helps his mum (Laura Fraser) and aunt (Christina Baldwin) in their basement mortuary.<\/p>\n
When the bodies coming in start to look like the work of a serial killer, the fascinated John quickly latches onto his amiable elderly neighbour Crowley (Christopher Lloyd) as a potential suspect. But are John\u2019s suspicions justified? What is Crowley hiding?<\/p>\n
With a film like this, it\u2019s so important to get the lead character right, and I Am Not A Serial Killer<\/em><\/strong> boasts an absolutely superb turn from Records (Where The Wild Things Are<\/em><\/strong>). The blend of John\u2019s fascination and fear is compelling, and Records finds both the humour in his lack of empathy and the humanity in his struggling to avoid what could very well be his destiny.<\/p>\n The snow-bound small town is the perfect setting for this story: families fighting to maintain normality, a minimal law enforcement presence, and no real possibility of escape. With dead bodies in the basement and a panda-balaclava-sporting, possible-killer, definite-stalker antihero, it\u2019s leaning into the horror genre even before the plot really kicks in but O\u2019Brien and his team root their story firmly in reality and maintain a real emotional depth throughout, helped by cinematographer Robbie Ryan (Slow West<\/em><\/strong>) and excellent supporting performances (Breaking Bad<\/em><\/strong>\u2019s Fraser is particularly good as John’s worried mother).<\/p>\n And then there\u2019s Lloyd as the friendly old-timer across the road\u2026It\u2019s difficult to talk too much about his performance without ruining anything, but it\u2019s some of his best work in years, as the veteran character actor switches between doddering and sinister beautifully.<\/p>\n The pacing and subject matter may alienate some viewers, but this is the kind of film that deserves to find a cult audience. It\u2019s a chilling, surprising and sensitive horror that you won\u2019t forget in a hurry.<\/p>\n This review of I Am Not A Serial Killer comes from its London Film Festival screening. It will be released in UK cinemas on 8 December.\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Max Records stalks Christopher Lloyd in chilly Gothic horror I Am Not A Serial Killer<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":39,"featured_media":91984,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"quote","meta":{"MSN_Categories":"Uncategorized","MSN_Publish_Option":false,"MSN_Is_Local_News":false,"MSN_Is_AIAC_Included":"Empty","MSN_Location":"[]","MSN_Add_Feature_Img_On_Top_Of_Post":false,"MSN_Has_Custom_Author":false,"MSN_Custom_Author":"","MSN_Has_Custom_Canonical_Url":false,"MSN_Custom_Canonical_Url":""},"categories":[2615,8],"tags":[797,5223],"acf":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.scifinow.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/10\/I_Am_Not_A_Serial_Killer_1-scaled.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.scifinow.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/91980"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.scifinow.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.scifinow.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.scifinow.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/39"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.scifinow.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=91980"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.scifinow.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/91980\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.scifinow.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/91984"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.scifinow.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=91980"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.scifinow.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=91980"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.scifinow.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=91980"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}