The Hole

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Year:	2001
Country of origin:	UK
Director:	Nick Hamm
Genre:	Irritating psyche-horror
Starring:	Thora Birch, Desmond Harrington, Daniel Brocklebank, Laurence Fox, Keira Knightley
Rating:	2/5
IMDB link:	http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0242527/
Tagline:	The hole will not be opened until 2001.
Favourite line:	None worth mentioning

Low-key British chiller from the early noughties.

The plot:
There’s a British public school.
It’s stuffed full of toffs.
They all strut around with their privileged noses in the air, and not one of these fuckers can actually formulate a consonant, the words coming out as a kind of rar-rar-rar-rar-rar, irrespective of what they are actually saying.
Very quickly, you hope they all die.
As luck would have it, there are some woods nearby.
In the woods, a metal hatch.
Beneath the hatch, a disused bomb shelter.
Our heroine Liz (Thora Birch) has the key.
Now, what would happen if her and a few pals head down into The Hole for a raunchy weekend? Frankly, who fucking cares?

It’ actually a decent setup, despite my sarcasm and, handled more effectively, this could have been a nice little, boiled down, old fashioned, Hammer style horror.
Instead, we have to tolerate the mindless antics of a bunch of posh sods worrying about what Mommy and Daddy will do if they get caught misbehaving.
Just fuck off, you gastropods in human guise.
Worse still, the actors involved are all clearly in their twenties, which just makes it all the more infuriating that they would behave in such a manner.
A pretty poor script, and a naïve structure – it keeps jumping out of The Hole, which breaks any sense of claustrophobia or tension instantly – though there is a nice line in intrigue throughout as, through an unconventional running order, the viewer is kept guessing as to what actually happened down in the shelter, with various possibilities played out before the grim reality is revealed.
Thora Birch makes for a relatively convincing lead, and Desmond Harrington of Dexter fame handles himself well enough, but the rest of them are weak, and Keira Knightley is fucking dreadful.
As irritating as it was intriguing, this almost had me reaching for the off switch by the half hour mark. Something held me back and, in a funny way, I’m glad I stayed to the end as it has simply served to reinforce my conviction that – shock, horror – British cinema just isn’t any good. I wish it were. I really do. But it ain’t.
Can’t recommend this, folks, and so annoying, even Knightley’s wonderfully pert little titties couldn’t save it.
Avoid.