Orphan (2009)

Directed by Jaume Collet-Serra. Starring Vera Farmiga, Isabelle Fuhrman, Peter Sarsgaard, Jimmy Bennett, Aryanna Engineer, Margo Martindale, CCH Pounder, Rosemary Dunsmore, Karel Roden. [R]

Still dealing with the trauma of a stillborn child, recovering-alcoholic Farmiga and husband Sarsgaard adopt a nine-year-old Russian girl named Esther (Fuhrman) to join an older brother and younger sister and make their family more “complete”…but something just ain’t right with little Esther, whose precociousness and incorrigibility may be (er, definitely is) masking the mind of a psychopath. Black comedy disguised as killer-kiddie horror, boasting a more-committed-than-needed performance from Farmiga and a nutty twist. The overextended final act delays the inevitable too long (although, I must admit, I was not expecting one character to die), and David Leslie Johnson’s script (from an Alex Mace story) teases genre clichés more often than subverting them, but there are enough ghoulish laughs to compensate for routine execution at certain junctures. The end credits look so much like the opening title sequence of Seven, all that’s missing is a little Trent Reznor on the soundtrack. Joel Silver and Leonardo DiCaprio are both listed among the producers. Followed more than a decade later by the prequel, Orphan: First Kill.

60/100