Hard Candy - 28th June 2006

This film was, as expected, rather disturbing but never really rang true.

It was a tale of a teenage girl taking vengeance on a paedophile for his past actions. But of course it was not as simple as that. Hayley presents herself as a young girl and therefore the Victim. She is then absolved of all wrongdoing since she is avenging the heinous crimes of this adult Jeff.

However, these roles were not so clear cut. Hayley had planned the whole incident meticulously and reacts unfeelingly to any of Jeff's pleas. Where Hayley is the cold, calm, logical adult, Jeff is as a child, whose crime was capitulating to his primal instincts. It is slightly worrying to hear how Hayley relishes the punishment she is meting out, also that we are never sure whether Jeff was guilty of these crimes or not.

This blurring of roles is interesting but I think the tone of the film was not consistent. Relating to the point above; Hayley acts as an adult and she is simply not believable as a 14 year old girl. This was despite (or because of) some fantastic acting - it was a bit like Dawson's Creek where actors deliver lines more suited to people thirty years their senior.

It worked well as a low-key affair; the occasional bursts of Action!, like struggling for the gun/knife, spoilt the whole atmosphere of it. I think I suffered from reading too much about the film - most of it was waiting in terror for the castration part, at which the whole audience let out a collective whimper.

The effects were noticeable: the blurring and the use of stark colours, often as the background to head shots; these tied in to the whole photography thing but I think it was a bit needless. Would it have benefited from a more 'realistic' style of photography (grainy film, hand-held camera etc)? Not sure.

One more thing. As far as I'm concerned a pedophile is someone who is rather fond of feet. 5