Child 44 - Suffers Lack Of Care

Rating: Null/10 (23 April 2018)

A story with promise and an interesting setting (serial child murders in Russia during WWII and beyond) is left labouring due to overbearing treatment. It suffers throughout from cinematography featuring clumsy hand-held cameras and zoom lenses set too close to the subjects - giving a suffocated and incomplete feel to the narrative. The entire treatment is dark and grotty and while this can sometimes be an atmospheric plus, here it's so unrelenting it becomes tiresome. Overly convoluted 'style' and heavy violence tend to be used as substitutes for quality story elements - this could leave some viewers unsatisfied - forced dialects are also off-putting and quickly become annoying. Fans of the stars Tom Hardy & Gary Oldman (the latter's role surfacing in the last half only!) may survive to the finish while others might give up way before the lengthy 2h 17m is halfway through.