Review of The Gift (2015) by Hidi H — 29 Apr 2016

Critically acclaimed film 'The Gift' is about a young married couple who encounter an old school friend of the husband, that has an old debt to settle, and he's about to do it in the severest of ways.

Just when everything looked like it was going in the right direction for the family; new home, new job, and now a baby on the way, history comes back to bite them in the bum, and throws the entire relationship into dismay.

In fairness, this is an extremely clever storyline with an unforeseeable twist towards the end. It's really all the film has to offer though, as it's very much plain sailing until the final few scenes.

There's very little action, drama, or suspense to this, and it was just crying out for some juicy bits to sink your teeth into. All the characters are relatively dull, and it's that slow paced, I thought the film had stalled.

Each day, the couple keep receiving gifts from the weirdo and they muse over whether they should be grateful or concerned. They'll then go to his house, or he'll come to theirs, and they'll have a chat and then muse over again whether he's genuine or not.

I literally fell asleep for a short while at this point but thankfully didn't miss enough of the tale to misunderstand the twist. This part alone scores the three star rating, but the other 90% is very forgettable.

Clever idea, but such poor execution.