Shudder Saturday: Daddy's Head (2024)

Daddy’s Head is far from the first film to use the trappings of horror to explore grief. It’s also far from the first film to explore growing tension between a parent and child. I have to say though, considering the plot description, that I didn’t expect to be thinking of one specific film so often throughout my time viewing this. That film was The Babadook. And this is much better than that.

Young Isaac (Rupert Turnbull) is left in the care of his struggling step-mother, Laura (Julia Brown), after the sudden death of his father. It may only be a temporary situation, because Laura may barely be able to care for herself at this time, let alone a child, but maybe they can help one another through the dark tunnel of grief until they see light at the end. Or maybe an interloper will make things even more difficult for them, especially when it seems to be Isaac’s father, back from the dead in a twisted and malevolent form.

The second film from director Benjamin Barfoot, who also wrote the screenplay this time around after making his feature debut a few years ago with Double Date (a glorious horror comedy written by the lead, Danny Morgan), Daddy’s Head is much more interesting and thought-provoking than I expected it to be. Balancing out the good and the bad, as well as the straightforward drama and the standard horror movie moments, this is a mature and careful exploration of grief that many may pass over due to the title and basic plot description. The two main characters don’t necessarily mean to make things any more difficult for one another, they just aren’t able to make things any easier as they become more and more pre-occupied with managing their own pain.

Turnbull and Brown are equally excellent in roles that require them to show themselves in a very poor light. The script helps them to be problematic without making them unbearable, thanks to the strong current of grief running through the film and the well-balanced performances. There are a few good supporting cast members helping to remind viewers of the potential for outsiders to observe and judge our leads, but the others who deserve a mention are Nathaniel Martello-White, complicating things as a slightly-too-close friend of Laura, and Charles Aitken as “daddy”.

On the one hand, I’m not sure who to recommend this to. On the other hand, I would love everyone to watch this. It will be a divisive experience, especially with the way in which things play out in the very last scenes, but patient viewers should find themselves rewarded with a film that uses some pulp fiction to shine a light on a dark and vital aspect of the human experience.

8/10

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Prime Time: Nativity Rocks! (2018)

How? How do we now have four of these bloody things? Especially when they keep getting worse. Well, that's not strictly true. The series seems to have bottomed out with the third instalment, making anything else released both as awful and slapdash as anyone still watching deserves. Which includes me, masochist that I am.

After his small part in the previous movie, Simon Lipkin gets to move front and centre here. He is the new Mr. Poppy, Jerry, cousin of the old Mr. Poppy (yes, Marc Wootton finally decided to move on from the series). Turning up at a school, Jerry is allowed to just immediately get himself involved with the Christmas musical that is being planned, a rock opera. Because schools are absolutely able to do that, as has been shown in every previous Nativity! movie. The rock opera needs to be done right, and there are a couple of main sub-plots, one involving a small boy who has parents too busy to take much notice of him, and one involving a child refugee separated from his father.

Okay, I will begrudgingly admit that, despite my harsh words opening this review, this fourth Nativity! movie feels ever so slightly better than the third one. If there was someone better in the lead role, it could have been an actual decent movie. But we get Lipkin in the lead role, a man who decides to perform his role as a cross between Wootton and Jack Black, with the skill of neither.

Writer-director Debbie Isitt seems to have made this her main focus over the past few years (I noticed there is a stage show version now, and I am assuming she will have at least some credit for that). None of these films have been very well-received, critically, but I know that the first two did great business. I can even see the appeal in the first one. And the second, which tries to repeat the main trick while adding in some David Tennant. But I am surprised that enough people saw, and enjoyed, the third to warrant a fourth. Will there be a fifth? Knowing my luck, probably.

I've already complained enough about Lipkin, spending any more time criticising him would feel too much like tripping up a small puppy, but there's a decent supporting cast here to at least partially make up for his central awfulness. Craig Revel Horwood may not be one of the better players, but he has a bit of fun with his role, giving us the main villain this time around. Daniel Boys, Helen George, and Celia Imrie all do well as the main adults caring for the children, Hugh Dennis and Anna Chancellor are good as the parents not paying their child much attention, and Ruth Jones brightens up the second half of the movie with her presence. Brian Bartle (Doru, the refugee) and Rupert Turnbull (Barnaby, the child with "absent" parents) aren't the best in their roles, but they don't do a terrible job, and I've sat through much worse child performances. You also get small roles for Meera Syal and Jessica Hynes, with the latter bursting in near the end with just the right amount of energy and humour to perk things up.

Not the worst, but that's a very low bar set by the previous movie, Nativity Rocks! feels like a return trip to a well that dried out some years ago. I really hope that they don't make another one. But I know I'll end up watching it IF it happens.

3/10

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