As the film is one of the last performances of the late Anton Yelchin, gone too soon, there was some intrigue surrounding what this film had to offer. The title bascially screams what type of people will be portrayed but doesn't give much away in the way of story.
With the terrible tag line as 'good breeding gone bad', which I found out after the film, it puts the film in a bit of hellish light. That line is cheap and tacky, exactly the opposite of what these two lead teens are or rather meant to be. While the film is meant to have us engulfed in the wealth that surrounds the two leads, I barely took note that this was the whole point of the film. Two spoilt 'messed up' selfish teens not getting their way so they take revenge. But I wanted to think beyond this stereotype as I saw it as a 'basic' film noir just in the wrong setting.
Amanda and Lily, former friends have drifted apart over the years but they brought together by a rather awkward forced bribed 'play date'. Amanda is awaiting trial for animal cruelty after she killed her horse. Lily has been expelled from school and is on thin ice with her step father who she hates. After the girls put the past behind them and Amanda reveals she can't feel and barely show emotions, the two restart their friendship. After Lily finds out she is being sent to a strict school enforced by her step father, she and Amanda plot to kill him off. Of course, Amanda doesn't know the real reason why Lily wants him gone.
Both Amanda and Lily are gloriously blank faced throughout, despite the fact that only Amanda is the one who can't feel. Both menacing and comical at times, the blank faced friends are committed to their crime, intendung to frame someone else, enter Yelchin as the local wannabe drug mogal who they try to blackmail into doing the deadly deed. With the lead up to the crime, the film is suspensful, drawing in on the film noir aspects, with two femme fatales, but when the climax never happens, the slow burning ending loses its shock factor and becomes slightly flat, even with that amount of blood.
The two leads, despite some fault with the story, which actually started life as a play, explaining a lot of location choices, Brits putting excellent American accents, Olivia Cooke and Anya Taylor-Joy are brilliant, especially the former. The twist of who's actually the monster shifting from start to finish is well executed and the main reason why the film stays focused. Not quite sure if this will be enjoyed by all, but hearing the comparisons to other such genre films is amusing.