TROUBLE IN MIND

REVIEWED - SNUFF-MOVIE: READERS who appreciate the ambitious, underrated cinema of Bernard Rose - his work includes mainstream projects such as Candyman and brilliant experiments such as Ivansxtc - will be interested to hear that the bizarre entity here reviewed is somewhere about the place.

Students of things meta-textual may be equally cheered to learn that such a singular director has constructed a piece in which allusions to the Manson murders, flavours of classic British horror and an apparent satire of Eyes Wide Shut are pressed together in a nested series of fictions, any one of which might represent the film's "real" world.

It might, however, be best for anybody so cheered to applaud Snuff-Movie from a safe distance. Indifferently acted, eye-wateringly cheap looking and uncertain in tone, the film comes across like the work of a modestly talented 12-year-old let loose with his parents' digital camera and no instruction manual. Like anarchism or flavoured vodka, Rose's dizzy mishmash sounds terrific in principle, but fails terribly when made real.

Snuff-Movie, which surely has only secured a theatrical release because Halloween is looming, finds an ageng horror director luring a group of actors to a secluded mansion with the professed aim of developing a new chiller. He is, in fact, planning to stage a genuine series of murders for the benefit of internet users. (Or is he?) Again, the expected nods towards reality television and supposed observations on the processes of pornography sound more intriguing on the page than they appear on screen.

Maybe, keeping in mind the allusions to low-grade horror, Snuff-Movie is actually supposed to look as amateurish and cheesy as it has turned out. If you find that such a supposition enables you to enjoy this odd film then you may wish to consider donating your potent irony glands to science upon your death.