ORPHAN: FIRST KILL
★★★
OUT NOW / CERT 15 / 98 MINS
DIRECTOR William Brent Bell
CAST Isabelle Fuhrman, Julia Stiles, Rossif Sutherland
This delayed follow-up to 2009’s Orphan is a better, weirder film. CGI, body-doubling and trick angles let the indispensible but now grown-up Isabelle Fuhrman reprise her role as Leena, a 30-year-old homicidal maniac whose growth-arresting medical condition allows her to pass for a child. Drawing from documentary The Imposter, Orphan: First Kill has the waif pose as the missing daughter of a rich family. And evoking Hammer’s Paranoiac, the ostensible villain turns detective as Leena wonders why some members of her new family eagerly accept her while others seethe. It defaults to the murder-every- 15-minutes horror sequel template, but Fuhrman’s calm malice remains fresh. Clever, unpredictable and gruesome.