The Owners

Based on the French graphic novel Une Nuit de Pleine Lune, Julius Berg's home-invasion horror transplants the action to rural England with depressingly familiar results. When lowlife Ian Kenny and his dim-witted pals Jake Curran and Andrew Ellis - plus tagalong girlfriend Maisie Williams - decide to rob elderly eccentrics Sylvester McCoy and Rita Tushingham, they get more than they bargained for. Unfortunately the viewer gets rather less. The early scenes, which show the gang graduating from burglary to kidnap, use shouting and swearing as a shorthand for authenticity. And, as violence looms, the ensuing stalking sequences aim for intensity but are merely unpleasant (though the wound effects are impressive). Williams and old pros McCoy and Tushington bring a bit of dignity to proceedings, but mostly we must watch unappealing characters infighting as events escalate unconvincingly around them. "Better than EastEnders, this!" remarks one. Not by a long shot.