Reviewed by Rama Gaind.
Directors: Cary Murnion and Jonathan Milott, Rialto Distribution.
Becky may not be to everyone’s liking. There is violence, but it’s purifying in this film as the young lady sets out to get revenge on a vicious bunch who deserve what they get.
Playing the title role, Lulu Wilson (The Haunting of Hill House, Annabelle: Creation) is an angry, rebellious young girl who likes to shoplift and chooses to disregard her father Jeff (Joel McHale). Her beloved mother is dead, her dad is about to marry another woman (Amanda Brugel) and the only beings she really seems to like are the family’s rescue pups.
Jeff takes Becky to a lake house in an effort to try to reconnect after her mother’s death. The trip immediately takes a turn for the worse when a group of convicts on the run, led by the merciless Dominick (Kevin James), suddenly invade the lake house.
However, Becky is away from the house when Dominick arrives, and that enables her to play with the home invaders … something along the lines of what young Kevin (Macaulay Culkin) did in Home Alone … but with a lot more bloodshed.
Becky is simply smarter than her attackers, and she’s able to swerve around them, well, in ways that can only lead to demise. It’s a good versus evil tale.
Described as an “ultra violent” Home Alone, Becky is a girl channeling her teen angst as she engineers a brutal revenge against the prison escapees who killed her father and dog.
James is known as a hilarious comic lead in television and film, but you’ve not seen him like this before: an intimidating, terrifying, neo-Nazi-convict-cult-leader. His performance brings an intensity and physicality to the role that has to be seen.
McHale brings a sincerity and grounded performance as Becky’s father. Impressive is his energy, enthusiasm and willingness to do anything. Wilson was actually
13 years old when this film was made and it’s easy to see she’s pure talent!
Becky began screening in cinemas nationally on 10 September, with Victoria to follow post-lockdown.
