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FORGOTTEN
REVIEWED
BY CHARITY BISHOP
Our
rating: 3 out of 5 Because
of: adultery, sexual content, thematic elements
Rated:
The
little girls are beautiful. The run with long golden
curls through the autumn festival, stringing banners
behind them. One in particular stands out, the leader
of the group. She takes her laughing friends into the
woods ... and never returns.
Ben
Turner (Paul McGann) has just returned from his
father's funeral. A contented bookshop owner in a
little English village where nothing extraordinary
ever happens, he is happily married and has a
beautiful daughter. Emmy (Karis Copp) is something of
a loner, teased at school and with very few friends,
but the disappearance of the local female bully has
her particularly jarred. Her loneliness encourages her
to seek the approval and love of the latest at the Bed
& Breakfast. Rachel Monroe (Amanda Burton) is on
holiday from her family, and shows an immediate
interest in the Turners. Ben's wife Natalie (Zara Turner)
rapidly discovers that their visitor has a quick
temper and a mysterious past. Her husband also knows
there's something infinitely familiar about her,
something he cannot quite put his foot on.
Called
into the investigation is Det. Chief Inspector Paris (Kathryn
Howden)
from London. There is no sign of the little girl, but
all indications point to a horrible crime. The means
of her disappearance, the fact that she may have been
strangled with a skipping rope, that no body has yet
been found, is a throwback to a case some twenty years
earlier in which the daughter of a woman named Carla Hayden
vanished. Little does the township know that Carla is
actually Rachel Monroe. A man was convicted of the
crime of kidnapping her daughter and killing her, but
managed to skip out on probation. The police presumed
he was dead after throwing himself off a cliff, but
Rachel knows better ... and believes it is Ben Turner.
What
follows becomes an intriguing game of assumptions,
blackmail, kidnapping, and murder with a surprising
and controversial twist ending. The audience has so
many suspects to choose from that they don't quite
know where to turn, and the instant one conclusion is
formed, another hastens forward to take its place.
It's very well written if not slightly sinister.
Amanda Burton is very under-appreciated in general but
this film relies heavily on her abilities. She is a
remarkably frightening character, one that is so cold
and resolved that you could believe her capable of
anything. McGann by contrast is personable but not
without his darker nature. It's an excellent pairing
and the rest of the cast merely rounds out the force
field these two create. There's also a wonderful
appearance by Christopher Villiers as the local police
chief. (Scarlet
Pimpernel fans might recognize him as Sir
Andrew.)
Forgotten
deals with many thematic topics including the
abduction and murder of children, and a woman's quest
for vengeance. Language is limited to one use of s**t
and a few mild profanities. There's minimal violence,
although a girl's waterlogged body is found,
discussion over a bloodied skipping rope leads to
theories that she was strangled, and some local boys
are chased after and threatened with violence by Ben
after throwing eggs at his window. A man is slapped
very hard across the face; a woman nearly drowns. Ben
and Natalie become physical in the kitchen; he opens
her shirt and kisses down to her waist. Just as
they're getting started on the counter, Rachel
interrupts them. Later, they start making out on the
couch. What disappointed me the most was that Ben and
Rachel commit adultery in a moment of angry passion.
There are consequences, but it wasn't needed to
further the plot.
The
primary reason I rented this was to see Amanda Burton,
and she was remarkable. It's a good mystery but
severely flawed, and the conclusion leaves the
audience wondering about the truth behind her
daughter's murder. Speculation is fun, but leaves a
lot of unresolved issues.
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