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House review of Hallam Foe (2007)

I don’t know what to make of this film. At time it feels like a sweet romance, but it’s got some really quite disturbing undertones.

Seventeen year old Hallam Foe is grieving for the death of his mother and goes on the run to escape his stepmother, who he believes to be responsible for her death. He quickly meets up with a woman who reminds him of his dead mother and develops an obsession with her. At first it’s hands-length and voyeuristic, played out amongst the vertiginous rooftops of Edinburgh with Hallam peering through windows, but later it becomes a sexual and disturbingly Oedipal relationship with the woman herself. I wasn’t sure whether to feel sympathy for young Hallam’s grieving process, odd though it was, or repelled by the relationship which just seemed plain wrong.

It’s a great central performance from Jamie Bell though, and he’s all grown up since Billy Elliot. He’s on screen pretty much all the time and it wouldn’t have worked if he hadn’t made the character likeable and vulnerable.

So yes, difficult to categorise this one, but none the worse for it. Like any seventeen year old, Hallam Foe is full of contradictions, a bit gangly, sometimes angry and often unpredictable, but also occasionally capable of great charm. And the movie’s kinda like that too.

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Film Rating: 6.4/10 (18 votes cast)

Reviewed by muz
Last updated:

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