Abigail
Splatter enthusiasts may well delight in Abigail’s excess, but the formula remains the same.
Cutting teeth: Alisha Weir
Photo Credit: Bernard Walsh, Courtesy of Universal Pictures
Sweet name. Sweet kid. However, for those who have seen Annabelle, they may suspect darker forces at play. Now I think of it, there’s also Abby, Carrie, Christine, Maggie, Thelma, Megan…
Abigail is 12-years-old, is played by Alisha Weir – who previously hogged the title role in Matilda – and is first seen in a spotlight and tutu performing a solo from Swan Lake. Swan Lake? Why did it have to be Swan Lake? Tchaikovsky is the first cliché that the directors Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett cling to in this absurdly OTT horror farce with more Kensington gore than you’d find at the NHSBT blood bank.
There is some early promise. A hit squad of sprightly caricatures, distinguished by their respective skills (the pretty blonde is the hacker, of course), break into a New York mansion with consummate ease. There they await the arrival of Abigail (code name: Tiny Dancer), sedate her and carry her off into the night. All goes according to plan, when they turn up at another grand pile to rendezvous with their contact going by the name of Lambert (Giancarlo Esposito). Their mission is to hole up for 24 hours, babysit the kid and wait for the $50 million ransom to materialise.
There is some unseemly banter and the candy-popping Joel (Melissa Barrera) turns out to be quite the Miss Marple by identifying the past lives of her anonymous colleagues. Frank (Dan Stevens) is obviously an ex-cop based on his stance and choice of words (she is correct), and so on. Then, a third of the way in, Abigail, the movie, switches from being a tense abduction thriller to something else entirely.
Any smarts initially exhibited by the film are swiftly squandered in the name of full-out Grand Guignol horror, where the one-liners are delivered with pantomimic zeal, disabling any chance of a chuckle. Dan Stevens gamely plays against type (he was Matthew Crawley in Downton Abbey), devouring the production design with relish, while everybody else follows suit. However, the real star is Alisha Weir, who not only has to master an American accent, but learn to pirouette in her pumps and perform a range of extensive stunt work. No doubt a certain segment of the horror market will lap this all up, but the excess is so far-fetched that it borders on the Pythonesque (cf. Renfield).
JAMES CAMERON-WILSON
Cast: Melissa Barrera, Dan Stevens, Kathryn Newton, Will Catlett, Kevin Durand, Angus Cloud, Alisha Weir, Giancarlo Esposito, Matthew Goode.
Dir Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett, Pro William Sherak, James Vanderbilt, Paul Neinstein, Tripp Vinson and Chad Villella, Screenplay Stephen Shields and Guy Busick, Ph Aaron Morton, Pro Des Sussie Cullen, Ed Michael Shawver, Music Brian Tyler, Costumes Gwen Jeffares Hourie, Sound Jon Greasley, Choreography Belinda Murphy.
Project X Entertainment/Vinson Films/Radio Silence Productions-Universal Pictures.
109 mins. USA/Ireland/Canada. 2024. UK and US Rel: 19 April 2024. Cert. 18.
