Shadows on the Wall | All the Devils Are Here

All the Devils Are Here

dir Barnaby Roper
scr John Patrick Dover
prd Ben LeClair, Leopold Hughes
with Eddie Marsan, Sam Claflin, Burn Gorman, Tienne Simon, Suki Waterhouse, Rory Kinnear, Ben Dilloway
release UK/US 26.Aug.25
25/UK 1h31

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Strikingly visual imagery is cleverly juxtaposed with gritty, sardonic characters in this British crime thriller. It's a claustrophobic movie, set over nine quietly tense days in a gloomy house in expansive English countryside. Director Barnaby Roper inventively mixes in humour, bleak drama and elements of horror, along with a superb collection of classic Cilla Black tunes. So even if the film is a bit gimmicky, it's thoroughly entertaining.

Longing to escape his life of crime, honourable thug Ronnie (Marsan) is assigned by his cold-hearted boss Laing (Kinnear) to stage a bank robbery. When it turns brutally violent, he holes up in an isolated pig farm on Dartmoor with hot-head cohort Grady (Claflin), unnerved driver Royce (Simon) and accountant Numbers (Gorman), who keeps the loot locked with him in his room. As cabin fever sets in, the plumbing backs up and food supplies run low, tempers begin to fray. Then a mysterious young woman (Waterhouse) knocks on the door, saying the boss sent her.

Darkly atmospheric touches add to the intensity, with the old stone farmhouse set against thunderous skies and windswept hills. These men are on edge, and flashbacks reveal the understanding each one has with Laing, who works for the even more fearsome unseen Mr Reynolds. These back-stories are minimal, only offering the usual insights. And their personalities are also fairly straightforward, even as the actors add intriguing nuance.

These are men who confront each other rather than work together. Marsan gives Ronnie a calm exterior, maintaining control over the situation without raising his voice. He has no patience for Claflin's superbly annoying hard-nut, who has no respect for anyone and delights in freaking the others out with grisly tales. Gorman is eerily serene as a seedy loner who hides away with his loud stereo and junkie paraphernalia. And Simon has a strong presence in a slightly sidelined role as the jittery, observant Royce.

Through all of this, a lovely melancholic tone is anchored in Ronnie's deep desire to be anywhere but here. In a voiceover addressed to his estranged daughter, he ruminates, "What I do leaves a stain that never goes away." Indeed, these are broken men, and it quickly seems impossible that any of them will get out of what already feels like a level of hell. So it's interesting to see a range of motives become apparent, from simple greed to a desire to start over. As if that's a possibility.

themes, language, violence 21.Sep.25

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