The Young Posisoner's Handbook

Bomb Rating: 

For at least an hour-and-a-half of this wretched film, I could have sworn my head was as heavy as a wrecking ball.

I begged the other members of the audience to perform the following experiment on me as "The Young Poisoner's Handbook" crawled toward its phlegmatic conclusion: A random member would take a sharp cutting knife, or an axe if they so desired, and carefully remove my head. Then, while standing on my theater seat, they would drop my head to the floor and see if it made a big hole in the solid concrete. Why? Because for at least an hour-and-a-half of this wretched film, I could have sworn my head was as heavy as a wrecking ball.

Even though it's based on actual events, this film is a blatant rip-off of Stanley Kubrick's "A Clockwork Orange." The young poisoner, Graham Young (Hugh O'Connor) kills his stepmother (Ruth Sheen) and his father (Roger Lloyd Pack), then is convicted of murder and sent away to a mental institution. In the hospital, he meets a doctor (Antony Sher) who rehabilitates Graham and sends him back out into society.

Aside from the fact that Stanley Kubrick is likely to sue the makers of this film for copyright infringement, this is the type of movie that makes you concerned about the shape of your chair. You start asking yourself questions like "Why isn't there more !@#$%&*! leg room?!" and "Why doesn't this !@#$%&*! thing recline?!"

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