Cherry Tree Lane

Directed by Paul Andrew Williams. Starring Rachael Blake, Tom Butcher, Jumayn Hunter Club, IFI, Dublin, 77 min

THE CAREER of Paul Andrew Williams has been a strange and puzzling business. Four years ago the young English director delivered a hugely acclaimed drama – something between oily verite and dark thriller – called London to Brighton. Next, to everyone's surprise, he moved into very broad, very cheesy comic-horror with

The Cottage. Now this thing.

Made on a small budget, Cherry Tree Laneis a home-invasion thriller in the style of Last House on the Leftand Funny Games. We begin with the archetypal middle- class couple bickering over pie and veg. The doorbell rings and a gang of drug-crazed youths bursts into the living room. They are associates of the couple's absent son and they wish him ill.

Presented in real time, Cherry Tree Laneis not the worst film ever to paddle in these waters. Shot in cool, disciplined fashion by Carlos Catalan, featuring original music by trip hoppers UNKLE, the picture always looks like the work of competent pros. It's just a shame that so much of it is dull.

Williams is to be commended for keeping the scenes of sexual violence off-screen, but he has failed to find anything interesting to fill the gaps. Huge swathes of the film feature witless monologues delivered in unconvincing urban argot by the implausible villains. At times it's hard to shift the notion that the unfortunate householders are being terrorised by Kevin and Perry from The Harry Enfield Show(innit?). What is Williams up to?