Dir. Brian O'Malley
Scr. David Cairns, Fiona Watson
Starring: Pollyanna McIntosh, Liam Cunningham, Douglas Russell, Bryan Larkin, Hanna Stanbridge, Niall Greig Fulton
Review By Greg Klymkiw
If you've seen Lucky McKee's delectably vile The Woman, you already know what a great actress (and babe) Pollyanna McIntosh is. Brian O'Malley's Let Us Prey, is a rip-snortingly scary, utterly demented supernatural take on John Carpenter's Assault on Precinct 13, which, for added kick, is liberally sprinkled with plenty of Irish Whiskey and smothered with globs of haggis (as its Irish-Scottish co-pro roots demand).
Featuring McIntosh's va-va-va-voom frame of womanhood stuffed into the tasty sausage sack of a form-fitting cop's uniform, she's clearly not here (as in McKee's picture) to be hung up nude in a barn and used for sexual gratification, but likeThe Woman, she more than admirably delivers the goods in terms of ass-kicking and major-league ultra-violent payback upon a fine selection of despicable scumbags.
Using the taut, imaginative screenplay by David Cairns and Fiona Watson as his blueprint for madness, helmer O'Malley skillfully leads us into the fiery pits of the first official night on the job for a newbie female cop in a Bonny Scottish station house located in the most remote locale imaginable. All you need know is that an event occurs which spirals the whole joint out of control as it's besieged by filth of the highest order - all demanding to be dispatched.
We get an alcoholic thug, a mass murderer, a self-flagellating killer of buff, young fellas and amongst corrupt, murderous cops, a child-raping kidnapper who may or may not be a demon from the utter depths of Hell itself. Of all nights, this is one in which our plucky heroine might have wished she'd been home washing her hair, then eating bonbons in front of the telly. But such is not to be the case. Violence must be done and we, the audience, are all the better for it.
THE FILM CORNER RATING: ***½ 3-and-a-half-stars
Let Us Prey was one of the closing night films at the 2014 edition of the Toronto After Dark Film Festival. It'll be coming to cinema and home entertainment venues near you via Raven Banner Entertainment and Anchor Bay Canada.