Crimson Peak

The combination of director Guillermo del Toro's flair for supernatural horror and gothic melodrama would appear to be a match made in heaven. And with Mia Wasikowska (who played Brontë's Jane Eyre in the 2011 adaptation) as the Eyre-like American innocent swept off her feet by Tom Hiddleston's brooding baronet and taken to his spooky ancestral pile in England, how could it go wrong? But this predictable if occasionally gruesome tale is a huge disappointment considering the talent in front of and behind the camera. As you'd expect from the director of Pan's Labyrinth, the sets are colourful and rich in detail but the same cannot be said of the script, dialogue or characters. Even Hiddleston, who has the ability to flip from charming to chilling in an instant, seems becalmed as the blue blood with ulterior motives for marrying his new bride. Jessica Chastain as his ice-maiden sibling fares no better while Charlie Hunnam (Pacific Rim) is bland as Wasikowska's to-the-rescue hero. It's not even very scary despite the sudden appearance of CGI-spawned writhing wraiths. What a shame.