The Boy (2016 film)

The Boy

Theatrical release poster
Directed by William Brent Bell
Produced by
Written by Stacey Menear
Starring
Music by Bear McCreary
Cinematography Daniel Pearl
Edited by Brian Berdan
Production
companies
Distributed by STX Entertainment
Release dates
  • January 22, 2016 (2016-01-22)
Running time
 97 minutes[1]
Country
Language English
Budget $10 million[3]
Box office $64.2 million[4]

The Boy (previously known as The Inhabitant) is a 2016 American-Chinese[2] psychological horror[5] directed by William Brent Bell and written by Stacey Delay. The film stars Lauren Cohan and Rupert Evans. Filming began on March 10, 2015, in Victoria, British Columbia. The film was released by STX Entertainment on January 22, 2016.

Plot

Greta, a young woman from Montana, escapes an abusive relationship by getting a temporary job as a nanny for the British Heelshire family. Upon arrival in the United Kingdom and the Heelshire residence, Greta introduces herself to Mr. and Mrs. Heelshire before meeting the elderly couple's young son, Brahms.

To Greta's surprise and amusement, Brahms is a porcelain doll, treated like a living child by his "parents." The real Brahms perished in a fire back in 1991, at the age of eight. Mrs. Heelshire, referring to the porcelain doll, states that Brahms has met "many nannies," all of whom were "rejected." Before the Heelshires leave on holiday, they give Greta a list of rules to follow, warning her that Brahms is not a normal child.

Initially, Greta follows a relatively normal routine, choosing to ignore the rules set in place for Brahms. She regularly calls her sister, Sandy, and befriends the Heelshires' flirtatious grocery boy, Malcolm. Soon after Greta's refusal to follow Brahms' rules, strange things begin to happen—a child's sobs are heard in the hallways, phone calls are cut off and Brahms seems to move on his own, vanishing before reappearing in other sections of the house. Greta finds herself locked in the attic by an unseen force and discovers pictures of the real Brahms playing with a little girl, his childhood friend, Emily. After he is served a peanut-butter-and-jelly sandwich outside her door, she begins to believe that Brahms' spirit lives on in the doll. Meanwhile, the Heelshires are seen on a coastline writing a good-bye letter to Brahms and filling their pockets with rocks before committing suicide by drowning.

After Greta demonstrates Brahms' ability to move by himself, Malcolm begins to frequent the house. He informs Greta that the real Brahms was friends with a young girl about his age, who disappeared after a playdate with him in the forest. The girl's body was later found with her skull crushed. Malcolm warns Greta not to stay in the house, but Greta, having previously suffered a miscarriage, feels obligated to care for Brahms and begins to follow his rules.

One evening, Greta discovers her ex-boyfriend Cole playing snooker in the Heelshires' home. He questions why she has the doll, and wishes to see the real boy. After establishing that there is not a boy, Malcolm arrives while the three of them eat dinner. Malcolm leaves the house but stays in his car in case anything bad happens. During dinner, Cole shows Greta plane tickets and is determined to bring her home, which she refuses to do, making him angry.

Greta then goes upstairs to put Brahms in bed, and asks him for help. Later on, Cole becomes even more enraged by the appearance of a message written in blood, as he presumed that Greta wrote it to scare him away. Greta says the doll may have done it, which he does not believe. He then pushes Greta and tries to take the doll, and upon hearing the commotion, Malcolm enters the room and an argument breaks out. Cole then loses his temper and smashes the porcelain doll. Immediately after, the house begins to shake, and the lights flicker. Cole goes to investigate a mirror in the room, when suddenly the mirror smashes open and the real adult and very much alive Brahms crawls through the shattered mirror. It is revealed that he was living within the walls of the house the whole time.

Brahms immediately attacks the group, trying to take Greta with him. Then, after overpowering the group, he kills Cole by stabbing him in the neck with a shard of the broken porcelain doll and then chases Greta and Malcolm throughout the house. They eventually escape to the attic where she discovers the room Brahms was living in, with a straw doll on a bed wearing her dress and jewellery, and embodying her image. Greta realizes that Brahms has been alive all along and was the one who was moving the porcelain doll throughout the house, stealing her possessions, and watching her every move. The Heelshires offered Greta (and the nannies before her) as a form of sacrifice to Brahms for "his keeping". Soon, the chase resumes and they find a little opening that leads outside of the house. Brahms incapacitates Malcolm after hitting him with a bat twice, and Greta escapes through the opening. Brahms is yelling after her saying that he will kill Malcolm if Greta leaves. She immediately returns after realizing that she needs to save Malcolm.

She returns, takes a screwdriver out of the cupboard and slips it into the back of her pants pocket. Greta confronts Brahms, telling him that she won't leave. She then orders Brahms to go to bed, treating him as she would the doll (Brahms is still a feral child in this regard). After Greta tucks him into bed, he asks for a good night kiss, which she begrudgingly accepts. However, when he tries to pull Greta in and make out with her, she changes her mind and stabs him in the stomach with the screwdriver. Still alive, Brahms retaliates by throwing her against a wall and begins to strangle her. Greta then reaches down to the screwdriver (still stuck in his stomach) and twists it in deeper causing him to drop her and presumably die. Afterwards, she escapes, rescuing Malcolm and leaving the Heelshire estate gate open behind her.

The film cuts to a scene of the open gate and then to a hand putting the porcelain doll back together, implying that Brahms is still alive. The film ends with a final glimpse of the repaired doll's face.

Cast

  • James Russell[7] as adult Brahms Heelshire

Production

On July 14, 2014, it was announced that The Devil Inside's director William Brent Bell was set to direct a supernatural thriller, The Inhabitant, which Tom Rosenberg and Gary Lucchesi would produce through Lakeshore Entertainment, along with Roy Lee, Matt Berenson, Jim Wedaa, through Vertigo Entertainment.[8] The script was written by Stacey Delay.[8] On January 23, 2015, Lauren Cohan signed on to star for the lead role in the film, which by then had been retitled The Boy.[6] On March 11, 2015, more cast was announced, which included Jim Norton, Diana Hardcastle, Ben Robson, Rupert Evans, and James Russell.[7]

On March 10, 2015, principal photography on The Boy officially begun in Victoria, British Columbia, at Craigdarroch Castle, announced by the studios.[9]

Release

On February 25, 2015, STX Entertainment acquired the US rights to the film and set the film for a February 5, 2016 release, but in March 2015 the film was moved up to January 22, 2016.[10][11] The film was released in the United States on January 22, 2016, alongside Dirty Grandpa and The 5th Wave, and was projected to gross $10–13 million from 2,671 theaters in its opening weekend.[12] The film made $3.9 million on its first day and $10.8 million in its opening weekend, finishing 5th at the box office.[13] The Boy grossed $35.8 million in North America and $26.6 million in other territories for a worldwide total of $62.4 million, against a budget of $10 million.[4]

Reception

On Rotten Tomatoes, the film has a rating of 27% based on 49 reviews and an average rating of 4.2/10.[14] Metacritic gives the film a score of 42 out of 100 based on 10 reviews, indicating "mixed or average reviews".[15] Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "B–" on an A+ to F scale.[13]

Joe Leydon criticized the average story line in Variety and commented, "Despite game efforts by the cast, this tepid horror opus is never scary enough to overcome its silly premise."[16] Chris Alexander of ShockTilYouDrop called it "one of the best contemporary wide release horror movies I've seen in years."[17] A reviewer for The Wrap wrote the "Scary-Doll Horror Flick Is Creepy and Clever".[18]

References

  1. ↑ "THE BOY (15)". British Board of Film Classification. February 9, 2016. Retrieved February 9, 2016.
  2. 1 2 3 "The Boy (2015)". British Film Institute. Retrieved June 13, 2016.
  3. ↑ "Can 'The Revenant' Beat Back 3 Newcomers to Finally Top Box Office?". TheWrap.com.
  4. 1 2 "The Boy (2016)". Box Office Mojo. Retrieved May 12, 2016.
  5. ↑ https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/the_boy/
  6. 1 2 Kit, Borys (January 23, 2015). "'Walking Dead' Star to Headline Horror Film 'The Boy' (Exclusive)". hollywoodreporter.com. Retrieved March 11, 2015.
  7. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Ford, Rebecca (March 11, 2015). "Lakeshore, STX Entertainment's Horror Film 'The Boy' Sets Cast (Exclusive)". hollywoodreporter.com. Retrieved July 25, 2015.
  8. 1 2 Busch, Anita (July 14, 2014). "'Devil Inside' Helmer William Brent Bell Set To Direct 'The Inhabitant'". deadline.com. Retrieved March 11, 2015.
  9. ↑ Lesnick, Silas (March 10, 2015). "Production Begins on The Boy, Starring Lauren Cohan". comingsoon.net. Retrieved March 11, 2015.
  10. ↑ Lang, Brent (February 25, 2015). "STX Entertainment Dates Films With Matthew McConaughey, Julia Roberts, Jason Blum". variety.com. Retrieved March 11, 2015.
  11. ↑ "STX Entertainment will now release THE BOY on January 22, 2016". twitter.com. Retrieved March 11, 2015.
  12. ↑ "'Revenant' Hunts #1 Amid Newcomers, '5th Wave', 'The Boy' and 'Dirty Grandpa'". boxofficemojo.com.
  13. 1 2 "'The Revenant' No. 1, 'Ride Along' Skids On Ice". deadline.com.
  14. ↑ "The Boy (2016)". Rotten Tomatoes. Retrieved May 11, 2016.
  15. ↑ "The Boy reviews". Metacritic. Retrieved January 28, 2016.
  16. ↑ Leydon, Joe. "'The Boy' Review: A Tepid Horror Movie". Variety.com.
  17. ↑ Alexander, Chris (23 January 2016). "The Boy is an Atmospheric, Wildly Gothic Gem". shocktilyoudrop.com.
  18. ↑ Chang, Inkoo (22 January 2016). "The Boy Review: Scary-Doll Horror Flick Is Creepy and Clever". thewrap.com.

External links

This article is issued from Wikipedia - version of the 12/5/2016. The text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike but additional terms may apply for the media files.