PIN CUSHION

Cert 15 81mins Stars 3

This brisk low budget British coming of age drama is a nightmarish revenge tragedy which is at times as darkly uncomfortable to watch as the name suggests.

Young Lily Newmark gives a well judged performance full of awkward angles as a teenage girl at at a school trying to fit in with the local mean girls.

Her clumsy attempts are hampered by her shyness and sexual innocence, plus the social inadequacies of her mother, a terrific Joanna Scanlan.

She’s weighed down with a club foot and a hunchback which emphasise the collision of reality and fantasy which lie at the heart of the script, by debut director, Deborah Haywood.

Putting her characters through a wringer of social media betrayal, self harm, alcohol abuse, she maintains our sympathy as the mother and daughter seek refuge in self created fantasies, one of which involves a glamorous air stewardess, played with toothy splendour by former Girls Aloud singer, Nadine Coyle.

 

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