Curio (2010)
Distributor: ISIS Ltd
DVD Release Date (UK): 12th September 2011
Directed by: Steven Nesbit
Starring: Wayne Russell, Jennifer Bryer, Sydney Wade, Richard Wood
Review by: Ben Bussey
All-American lady Lauren (Jennifer Bryer) and her half-English little girl Emily (Sydney Wade) travel to the Yorkshire moors to visit the quaint little cottage that was left to them by a recently deceased relative. No sooner do they get there before a neighbour pops by to say hello; a kindly old dear who dabbles in bakery and, er, fortune telling. However, her efforts at reading Lauren’s future yield somewhat unexpected results, inasmuch as she speaks in a demonic voice for a moment then drops dead. Soon enough a bumbling local policeman shows up and decides to take Lauren in for questioning, which she is none to happy about. Rather than co-operate, Lauren opts to headbutt the PC and run off with Emily onto the moors. Next thing she knows she’s tied up on a bed in an unfamiliar room, with a gunshot wound in her shoulder and a creepy farmer named Len (Wayne Russell) playing nursemaid, who won’t tell her where her daughter is. Yes, things are going from bad to worse.
And when I say things go from bad to worse, I don’t just mean for the protagonists. I mean for anyone unfortunate enough to find themselves watching this utterly, utterly abysmal film.
Overhearing the DVD, my wife enquired as to whether I was watching The League of Gentlemen. It’s fair to say the world Steven Nesbit presents in Curio is not too far removed from that of the League’s fictional Yorkshire town of Royston Vasey, with its broad caricatures and even broader accents, and a tone so bizarre the viewer is left uncertain as to whether they should laugh or not. The key difference is that, so far as I can tell, Curio is played straight. We are meant to take what we see entirely seriously. Which, believe me, is nigh-on impossible. From start to finish, Curio aims high and fails miserably on almost every level.
Okay, so I said almost every level; seems only fair I should acknowledge that which works. Wayne Russell, whose performance here earned him the Best Actor award at the 2010 Los Angeles Movie Awards (nope, I’ve never heard of them either), does in all fairness do a pretty good job with what he’s given. A very English variation on the Norman Bates archetype, Len is a man haunted by a strict religious upbringing, on the cusp of madness thanks to years of isolation, as repulsed by ‘sinful’ behaviour as he is tempted by it. For him to suddenly have a beautiful woman captive in his own home is pretty much a dream come true, but – much like our old friend Norman – the only woman in his life is his mother. It’s not the most unique character ever created, and Nesbit’s script does him no favours, but Russell does make for a convincing backwoods psycho, even managing to make him fairly sympathetic. In other circumstances, that would be enough to keep the film from being an outright failure. Not so here, I’m afraid.
So how, you ask, does Curio fail? Let me count the ways. Aesthetically, it’s as flat as a pancake, with utterly bland and unimaginative camerawork. The story is an absolute mess, littered with contrived plot devices, laboured dialogue and thoroughly implausible actions. The worst offender here, on the part of both writer/director Nesbit and actress Jennifer Bryer, is the character of Lauren. Firstly, there’s absolutely no reason for her to be an American, other than the obvious hope that it will help sell the film internationally. Secondly, the character is not remotely endearing or convincing at any point; don’t tell me a mother who finds herself alone in a stranger’s house would not immediately demand to see her child, or that she wouldn’t act the second she saw the opportunity to escape, which certainly occurs more than once. Thirdly – and most significantly – Jennifer Bryer, on this evidence, cannot act to save her life. I don’t want to be mean, but I have to call it like I see it. She is awful, plain and simple. I see from IMDB this is her only screen credit to date, and I truly, truly hope it stays that way.
The only other thing to note about Curio is my absolute bewilderment as to how and why Graham Coxon, formerly guitarist of Blur, came to do the musical score. He’s a fantastic musician and composer, one who I could easily see having an illustrious career in film music, so quite why he would give his services to so inauspicious a film as this I cannot fathom. It’s certainly an interesting and unusual score, with an eclectic mix of sounds and styles, and I suppose the best we can say is that it emphasises the overall weirdness of proceedings. But, as I should think I’ve made clear by now, it isn’t enough to save the film.
Please believe me when I say I wish I could tell you Curio is great. As someone born and raised in Yorkshire, it’s wonderful to see local filmmakers like Nesbitt making films here, and I really wish I could be celebratory. But if Yorkshire is to become a home for independent filmmaking it’s going to need a hell of a lot more than Curio brings to the table. It is, plainly and simply, a disaster.