User reviews

Ridley's first film in way too many years is a dark urban fairytale about a young photographer who encounters murderous demons on the streets of London. Firstly, I have to admit to being a huge fan of Ridley's work and The Reflecting Skin is in my personal Top 10 movies of all time, so I have to say I loved this genre-playing horror film.

Heartless is, to my mind, Ridley's most conventional film to date as it is the first truly genre-based film he has made, but, underneath the conventions of the horror film we find his usual philosophical musings on death, beauty, existentialism, good and evil, chaos and the individual's struggle to make sense of the world.

Heartless is a step towards the mainstream for Ridley and that may well be its commercial undoing; too "mainstream" genre for the art-house crowd, too cerebral for the thrill loving multiplex gore-hound.

Ultimately, this is a serious film, a dark and often beautiful film that haunts the mind after viewing and already demands a second viewing of me to unravel some of its dark mysteries. Intelligent, moving, sometimes shocking and occasionally funny this is an engrossing and enjoyable piece of work that gives food for thought as well as an entertaining ghost train of a ride. Approach this one with an open mind and you will be rewarded with a strong contemporary horror film with some real depth and intelligence.

This is a "psychological" thriller as much or more than a horror film. First, Jim Sturgess is excellent and has a brilliant career ahead of him. Why we haven't seen more of Joseph Mawie, the "devil" character, over the years is beyond me. Mawie is extremely creepy and steals his scenes. Timothy Spall and Ed Marson are underrated, though you've seen them a thousand times.

The depiction of dark London is well done. And the supernatural elements are well introduced, conservatively used and blended well with the psychological travails of our main character. But there is so much going on that at times I caught myself trying to piece bits together to guess at what I was supposed to be guessing at. The "neighbor" functions as a good foil but we're led to believe he has/will have something to do with the plot, which he really doesn't. The "nephew" subplot, though of some importance to a a late plot explanation, becomes annoying early on and the actor is less than convincing.

Fun nonetheless. Difficult to make a passable horror film these days.

This movie is a failed attempt at real horror and drama. It kind of leaves you feeling like you just meandered through a film with an aimless plot that only skimmed the surface of the occult and demon world. There's so many obvious questions that aren't asked or answered by the main character, Jamie, in places where common sense would suggest there should be.

The writer's left out key elements that could have made this film something more than an empty plot, to a believable story that actually had meaningful dialog - it didn't. While the acting was film-worthy and the gritty urban dark feel and tone of the film gave it presence, the script did nothing to support the look of the film nor it's characters from what laid just below the surface of the macabre.

I believe Ridley, the director, was trying to convey looking into oneself and discovering the beauty within. But what he did was turn it into a tragic affair of the heart leaving you feeling "Heartless" for the film.

There are characters thrown in that begs the question, "who are they," and why are they there. Having someone just pop in with no back story then attaching themselves to the main character in the film is like plopping a kid in your lap and having it call you "daddy." It kept you wondering, but not in a good way, that would make you get up and walk out of the theater if you weren't watching it at home.

Towards the middle of the movie, it takes on an entirely different mode, which should have been played out further with the two main characters, Tia and Jamie and their relationship - that's where the real meaningful story was.

In conclusion, the story leaves you feeling empty like you didn't have any meaningful or profound message that you could take away from it spending almost two hours of your life, which you'll never get back.

Do yourself a favor and pass on this trite scare tactics with a pointless ominous soundtrack and plot with a myriad of stories that take an abrupt turn into one another and make no sense.

This film isn't Heartless, it's pointless!

Philip Ridley is an artist, a writer and a film director whose work is considered unconventional and unique in every form he touches. Some how he manages to marry all of these forms in his most recent HEARTLESS, including writing the lyrics to the many songs by David Julyou that play such an important role in the unfolding of this visit to the Faust legend. It is harsh, dark, disturbing, and at times a bit over the top as far as his need to make visual things that go bump in the dark. But in the end, with the incomparable help of featured actor Jim Sturgess, he makes it work.

Jamie Morgan (Jim Sturgess) is a young 25-year old photographer living in a squalid area of London with his loving mother (Marion Morgan): Jamie bears a birthmark on his face and the upper torso that makes him the victim of prejudice by the boys in the neighborhood and has resulted in his living the life of a recluse. Jamie's brother and nephew (Luke Treadway and Justin Salinger) stay close to the home but are preoccupied with other matters - some good some bad. Jamie longs for his departed father (Timothy Spall) who 'made the world make sense' and he longs for a relationship with a girl so that he can have a family and be normal. Walking the streets at night Jamie hears screams and witnesses sights that terrify him: he is aware that gangs rule the world and in time he is assaulted with his mother during a night walk and his mother is killed. In an attempt to find sense out of chaos Jamie becomes friends with a new neighbor AJ (Noel Clarke) and is offered a handgun by a local merchant (Frazer Ayers) 'to protect himself. As Jamie becomes more terrified with the creatures he sees in the night and angered by the death of his mother he ultimately meets Papa B (Joseph Mawle) who just happens to have strange powers to offer Jamie anything he wishes. Jamie makes a pact with Papa B, agreeing to promote chaos in the streets in the form of writing graffiti in turn for Papa B removing the ugly birthmark from his body. Papa B's young girl assistant Charlie (Nadia Theaker) bonds with Jamie and becomes like the daughter Jamie has always wanted.

Now, without the physical disfigurement Jamie attracts a pretty delivery girl Tia (Clémence Poésy) and seems to have found his wishes come true - with Tia and Charlie as family. But Papa B has other plans and sends his Weapons Man (Eddie Marsan) who gives Jamie an altered version of his assignment from his pact with Papa B and the world becomes ruled by horror. How Jamie responds to his new bizarre assignments changes the course of the tale, a course best not shared in a review.

Jim Sturgess makes this role of a seemingly impossible spectrum of acting an example of just how skilled he has become in his craft. The cast is good but burdened with many aspects of the bizarre that keep the viewer form connecting in a positive way. The cinematography by Matt Gray is appropriately dark and the visual effects, though excessively ugly, make the atmosphere of this dark tale work. It is a strange film and requires that viewer to suspend disbelief, but the impact and underlying message is strong.

Grady Harp

After hearing from the Director , Philip Ridley , about this movie on radio five i decided to to give it a go and i'm really pleased i did. You cant really put this film just into the Horror genre because it is much more than that. The movie looks stunning and the acting is of the highest quality (although i would have liked to have seen more of Eddie Marsen). To say it is thought provoking is an understatement and a great deal of praise should go to the Director for taking on such a heavy subject. My only criticism is i felt it began to lose it's way a little bit about 90 minutes in , but thankfully it's conclusion pulled it around wrapped up things very nicely.

Recommended.

Wonderfully, powerfully, moving and thought-provoking. It is a rare thing for a horror film to genuinely touch me, but Heartless did just that. It was such an odd mixture of creature-feature horror, a stunningly emotive story and fantastic characterisation that it really defies classification.

One thing I do know, however, is that watching Heartless gave me an experience like no other 'horror' film I've seen. The scare moments were in there, and I jumped in all the right places, but the deeper storyline, so brilliantly given life by Jim Sturgess and Nikita Mistry, was what made this film stand out as one of the best I have seen all year. As a general rule I'm not fond of creature/demon based films, because human beings are a lot scarier to me than something that doesn't exist, but far from being just a quest to scare you, this felt like a film that also compelled you to think, and that is where it excelled.

The characters were refreshingly three-dimensional, and I really grew to care for them, which made the story all the more engaging – I wanted things to be alright for Jamie, I was rooting for him, and the deeper I got into the story, the scarier it became. That is how horror should work, it should suck you in to a point where you feel what the protagonists are feeling; that is how to produce a real scare. Not just in a jump out of your seat moment, but in the moments after the film has ended and beyond, where you think and contemplate what you may have done in the situation.

The direction was excellent and the actual cinematography and use of photographs within the film was gorgeous. The standout element though was by far the superb acting throughout the entire piece. The leads in particular were impressive, but all of the supporting cast were stellar too.

Heartless was a winner for me, because it is a film that I know will stay with me for a long time, and could well become one of my go-to films when someone asks me for a gem.

Hello i think this movie is a masterpiece,but is not for everyone, if you want some teen,horror,easy,scare you might want to watch something else! it is intelligent and beautiful to watch. Starts of slow and even gives you some laughs.It delivers some scares and the best thing is that it never shows or give to mutch away. I hate movies that shows to mutch of the scarry parts. Good acting and great music that grows on you every time you watch it. its one of those that you want to watch again and again. Like Donnie darko or memento! Looking forward to next movie from philip ridley :) and if you get a chance to see this on the big screen don't miss it ! This is my first review i have written but i really liked this movie :)

I'll keep this short as i could rant for hours about how awful this film was.If the director had any sense this would have made for a very good short,there was only 15-20 minutes worth of plot padded out with scenes of Jim Sturgess walking slowly around London and showing off his one acting face(its a half grin that he wears for almost the whole runtime).

With crap like this still being funded and praised it is small wonder that the British film industry is on its knees.

P.S heartless drinking game....take a shot every time someone says "old son"and you will be dead before the credits roll.

Many people have devils/demons inside and some think there are outside too... And the reasons are usually related to childhood and family. Thus, the plot in Heartless is trivial, exploited several times (and likely in the future as well). Indeed, I am sure there are lots of viewers who consider bonfire, explosions, immolation, monster masks etc. horrifying and intense, but I am not an admirer of those elements used constantly, making the watching tedious at times. Luckily, there are some good performances, particularly Jim Sturgess as Jamie Morgan and Eddie Marsan as Weapons Man, the rest were nothing special, and Papa B's and Lee's characters were rather stodgy. The length 115 minutes was also too much and the ending was probably meant to be sophisticated, but resulted in pretentious reasoning.

For a British film, nothing special, there is much more interesting stuff out there.

I don't normally watch horror movies but this once caught my eye since it was a Brit movie and starred Eddie Marsan and Timothy Spall. But, I was really disappointed. The story was disjointed and I just didn't believe in the characters. At times I found myself laughing out loud; not really the sort of reaction for a horror movie. I'm not even sure that it is a horror movie.

I gave it the benefit of the doubt but it really was a chore to watch it right through. I'm more frightened by the time that I've wasted watching this movie than I was about any of the content.

It had the potential to be amazing, but failed miserably.

Now,... I never feel motivated to write reviews; This is my first. Although in the past I've seen many great motion pictures and thought about it, I just didn't want to spend the time putting my feasibly mundane typed words into a critique.

To the people that rated this a 1 star and said don't waste your time, I'm happy I decided to anyway. To anybody reading this, don't pay attention to those people. Actually, I feel sorry for those reviewers, because they completely missed the point of this piece of art. It is not your typical horror. To call it a horror would be like calling moonlight sonata just a piano song; or the person closest to you just a human. This film is beyond deep. Philip Ridleys portrayal of facing your own demons, your fears, and exposing some rays of happiness through darkness, is one of the most strange yet gorgeous things I've seen ever in a movie.

If you watch this film and are not moved in some way, I honestly wouldn't know what to say. Because this visual masterpiece is in my eyes one of the greatest I've ever seen. I don't care what the critics say, or some random individual who has the mind to dismiss it as just a complex meaningless thriller. To me, this was a heart-moving, near perfection, possibly life-changing viewing; possibly due to the fact that I instantly related to scenes in the movie. It was like looking at my soul in the clearest of mirrors. The ending was..well there's no word for it.

I really hope more people have watched this one and understand what I feel right now. I feel..reborn.

'Heartless' contains a lot of great moments, features a terrific cast and is moodily directed. Timothy Spall, Noel Clarke, Ruth Sheen have brief roles, and Jim Sturgess is astonishingly good as Jamie, the shy young man living in an inner city, crushed by the large birthmark that covers half of his face and much of his upper body.

A keen photographer, he witnesses hooligan crimes committed by a group of hooded creatures, only vaguely seen. He meets up with demonic Papa B (Joseph Mawle) and his (very) young assistant Belle (Nikita Mistry), and strikes a deal that might prove his salvation - or damnation.

Things start off brilliantly, but the film gets a bit too carried away with itself. There are possibly too many ideas, becomes difficult to follow and the central emotional thrust is lost. There are moments of unexpected but effective humour, but most events chronicle the hopeless intensity of Jamie's plight. Although he is wonderfully played, it becomes a bit too much. Whilst things move quickly, it might have been a good idea to slow things down a little, leave a few things out, and allow some of the interesting sub-plots to develop more naturally (Noel Clarke as AJ could have been explored more, possibly at the expense of the character She (John Macmillan) who is interesting, but ultimately superfluous.

Well worth a watch for its atmosphere is gruesomely effective set pieces. My score is 6 out of 10.

Heartless is simply incomprehensible.

Although intriguing to begin with and supported by strong visuals, the narrative strays off from it's desire to be considered a British faustian fairy-tale and enters the realms of just not making sense. At times it's almost as if they movie we are watching is not actually the movie we are supposed to be seeing - all the narrative forward motion happens outside of the protagonists actions.

I am told that the director is a bit of a cult favorite but i really cannot understand why? Has someone recently changed the meaning of the word cult to crap?

In fact, i give up trying to find good in it... it's simply terrible.

Philip Ridley brings us a new style of horror. Mesmerizing and twisted, Heartless tries to appeal to our deepest senses - fear simply being one of them - by means of psychology. The "monster" in this so called horror drama, is not a monster at all but an inner pattern of what makes us humans; of what our feelings may turn us into.

Perhaps the movie is slightly underrated because the point of view that should have been used to look at this movie was not from the outside of the box but from the inside.

The performances were pretty good especially from Joseph Mawle(Papa B) whom i have only seen in Merlin, Eddie Marsan("Sherlock Holmes") and his charismatic flavor and of course Jim Sturgess who proves once again that he is a British star on a dark sky. However i expected somewhat more from Clemence Poesy("War and Peace", "In Bruges) other than a lovely accent.

Overall, i give "Heartless" an 8/10 for the feelings they tried to bring up but failed in a small measure. I do believe that concentrating even more on the feelings and less on the horror part would've brought this movie a greater rating. Nonetheless, it is worth two hours of your spare time.

Is beauty truly only skin deep? A man (Sturgess) born with a large birthmark on his face has spent his life dealing with stares. After a strange attack the birthmark disappears. With a new found confidence he lives his life like he's always wanted. His life changes again when he is visited by a stranger. The first half of this movie is very very slow and I had to struggle to get through it. It picked up somewhat, and actually parts of it are really good, but it is very drawn out. The ending has a neat twist to it, but it's a struggle to get there. The second half made up a little for the beginning, but this is not what I expected. I wasn't paying that much attention to this movie because it wasn't holding my interest the entire time, but the last half is actually pretty good. I give it a C-.

Would I watch again? - No, I barely made it through the first time.