10-06-2021, 09:45 AM
Who knew that there are two Attenboroughs? Yeah, okay. Everyone but me. (Always the last to know these things.) So there's David Attenborough of the fluttery whisky voice who narrates the sex lives of timid tweeters and other natural wonders. And then there's Richard Attenborough the actor. Brothers, mind you! Well, it's too late to make room in my ole brain for two of them, so I'm collapsing them into one, and will treat this movie as starring David Attenborough. Because I don't have the bandwidth for this duplicate shit.
A young couple with their newborn come to the film's title address, hoping to rent a room. Though of limited means, they succeed, which is rather unfortunate, because the landlord turns out to be none other than world-renowned naturalist David Attenborough. Now this Attenborough guy, he's always staying up late nights making bird sounds. You'd think the couple would be kept awake by their colic baby. But no, the constant crying of their baby is no match for David Attenborough's bird songs.
All right, enough nonsense. This is a really creepy crime thriller. Attenborough is riveting as the landlord whose a wee bit twisted. His every look, lie, deception, his every manipulative trick. Absolutely chilling. Yet perhaps equaling his performance is the couple played by Judy Geeson and a John Hurt so young that he merely looks burned out.
Based on real events, this film sticks to the facts as much as possible. The dialog is as accurate as it can be, using court stenography and other recordings where possible. That in no way detracts from the drama. It unfolds like one of those corpse plants, just getting riper in so many lurid ways until it reaches full bloom.
A young couple with their newborn come to the film's title address, hoping to rent a room. Though of limited means, they succeed, which is rather unfortunate, because the landlord turns out to be none other than world-renowned naturalist David Attenborough. Now this Attenborough guy, he's always staying up late nights making bird sounds. You'd think the couple would be kept awake by their colic baby. But no, the constant crying of their baby is no match for David Attenborough's bird songs.
All right, enough nonsense. This is a really creepy crime thriller. Attenborough is riveting as the landlord whose a wee bit twisted. His every look, lie, deception, his every manipulative trick. Absolutely chilling. Yet perhaps equaling his performance is the couple played by Judy Geeson and a John Hurt so young that he merely looks burned out.
Based on real events, this film sticks to the facts as much as possible. The dialog is as accurate as it can be, using court stenography and other recordings where possible. That in no way detracts from the drama. It unfolds like one of those corpse plants, just getting riper in so many lurid ways until it reaches full bloom.