DEVIATION

Pretty nurse Amber (Anna Walton) strolls obliviously down the street one grey afternoon, chatting chirpily to her pal on her mobile telephone. She ends the call and gets in her car - and is promptly overpowered by Frank (Danny Dyer). With a knife to her throat, he forces her to ring her family and tell them she loves them very much - then he makes her start the car up and take him to his friend's place.

As they drive through a curiously sedate London, they listen to the car radio and we learn that Frank has just escaped from Broadmoor. The news report tells us he killed three women, and is the suspected murderer of a teenaged girl whose body has never been found despite a decade of police searches. For what it's worth, he denies the latter accusation.

Amber drives Frank to a run-down building, where he meets former cellmate Bob (Ben Wigzell) and introduces the quivering lass as his fiancee. As Frank goes in the house to chat with Bob, Amber tries frantically to free herself from the knots he's tied her in. She fails and, a quick murder, shave and change of clothes later, Frank returns. And then, the pair are back on the road again - in Bob's car. Frank reveals that he knows a smuggler pal in Kent who has a plane waiting for him at 8am the next morning. He wants Amber to take him there, through the night. She just needs to keep her cool, she tells herself, and she may live to see her loved ones again.

But first, there is a long night ahead, punctuated by an occasional timeline in the bottom of the screen.

Frank is quick to demonstrate to Amber just how dangerous he can be, first slashing the throat of a young hoodie who rushes to her aide when she cries for help, and next strangling old acquaintance Brian (Roy Smiles) when he coincidentally stumbles across the pair as Frank is about to kill Amber for attempting to run away.

Having regained control of his captive, Frank and Amber continue their journey by car - he now taking the wheel. As the night draws on there are more altercations (travel cops; Frank's biggest fan, etc) and a whole heap of cringe-inducing discussions between the killer and his quarry: they muse over the existence of karma, Frank's past, his penchant for poetry and more.

Will Amber be able to outwit her captor, or even put up with his self-important ramblings? Will Frank reveal his true plan to her - or kill her first?

DEVIATION beats BROKEN for dispensing with expositional detail and getting right down to the nitty-gritty: the action starts immediately, with the opening title sequence barely over before Amber has been abducted. This is all good and well, but does mean the film's pace can only slacken as it pushes through one episodic encounter to the next over the course of 86 minutes.

Well photographed and proficiently edited, the biggest stumbling block for DEVIATION is its rather banal screenplay. Written by director J K Amalou (HARD MEN), the film kicks off with a simple premise and for a short while shows the promise of being a tad different to the average serial killer flick. But it swiftly settles into a rut of pedestrian cod psychology and stupidly set-up violent set-pieces. Outside of the lead duo, characters are brought in to play for no other reason than to be killed by Frank. And that's not as much fun as it may sound.

Dyer's performance is an odd one. He seems to be acting really badly at first, but then you realise he's in character - and, to be fair, he's playing against type. It's clearly a role Dyer has felt he can immerse himself in, shaking off his swaggering Cockney persona to create a child-like, insecure bully who feels fleeting remorse each time he kills. His character, alas, is not an original one: you've seen the type many, many times before - and Amalou's script robs a fine performance of much credibility when he starts having Frank give away bad childhood memories to Amber.

Walton is fine to look at and mostly a very adept actress, only faltering when the script requires her to swear - something she's visibly uncomfortable about doing.

Amalou's direction makes scenes of violence unintentionally funny, and kills the overall film of any real pace. Without pace, there's little in the way of tension and you're left analysing the actors and the fact that London seems unnaturally quiet throughout proceedings, rather than getting lost in any potential drama.

Still, for those who stick around there are a couple of semi-successful twists to be found in the second half. Whether or not you'll care is another matter: you may have already been put off by then, by the unrealistic direction in which the relationship between Amber and Frank heads. Actually, viewers may well be asking themselves frequently throughout the film, "why doesn't Frank just kill her straightaway like he kills everyone else?". Good question ...

Revolver Entertainment's UK DVD release serves the film uncut in its original 2.35:1 aspect ratio. The transfer is 16x9 enhanced. The picture quality is excellent, offering a highly detailed and accurately coloured presentation while retaining a filmic feel throughout.

English audio is offered in 2.0 and 5.1 mixes. Both are good propositions, with the latter making full use of the film's canny sound design from the get-go.

The disc's animated main menu page gives way to a static scene-selection menu allowing access to the film via 12 chapters.

The only extra is a 19-minute Making Of documentary. In this, the principal cast and crew members offer retrospective thoughts on what attracted them to the film and the challenges they faced while making it (weather; budget). Amalou and Dyer, understandably, get the most screen time, in-between some decent snippets of on-location background footage.

DEVIATION isn't a classic, or anything near, but Dyer gives a committed performance and Walton is gorgeous even when acting extremely distressed.

Revolver's disc is a basic one, but the film presentation itself is top notch.

Review by Stuart Willis