A scene from 'Whistle'

Whistle review: Great ideas in recycled packaging

‘Whistle’ features a series of creative kills, inventive executioners and a regrettably recognizable story.

Death fascinates humans. Whether they want to prevent it, flirt with it or know what comes after, it’s a topic of interest. We anthropomorphize death in the form of a grim reaper lurking in the shadows, waiting to whisk us away. We contemplate the existence of fate and its role in our existence. Is a life destined to end at a fixed time in a predetermined way? Can someone change their fortune? Death is one of life’s certainties and its greatest unknown. In Whistle, a cursed object offers a glimpse at death with dire consequences.

Chrys (Dafne Keen) arrives in her new, small-town home on the heels of the tragic death of the high school’s basketball star. They inadvertently assign her his former locker, which is not empty. Among its contents, Chrys finds an ancient artifact. It looks like a creepy musical instrument, similar to a kazoo. No one’s sure of its exact origins, but the darkly ominous inscription matches the Aztec death whistle’s foretelling name. Accordingly, anyone who hears the whistle is on borrowed time. As people suffer mysterious or even impossible deaths, it’s up to the new girl to figure out how to stop the cycle and save her friends.

The film starts strong with a tight basketball game on the brink of collapse due to supernatural interference. The spectre’s appearance is shocking, immediately establishing an intense tone for the film. Fast forward to Chrys’ arrival and it’s like letting the air out of a taut balloon. Stereotypical jock grandstanding is interrupted by kind popular girls and the rekindling of a forgotten friendship. Thus, alongside Chrys’ self-identified nerd of a cousin, the narrative establishes her friend group and the whistle’s potential victims.

The actors fit the cookie cutter, conventional look for each of their personality types. Fortunately, most of them are convincing in their roles, even when their character does something ill-advised. This includes Nick Frost, who plays a somewhat knowledgeable history teacher. However, filmmakers seem to have prioritized appearance over suitability when it came to casting the lead. The goal was clearly a Lydia Deetz-Wednesday Addams type, which is an aura that radiates from Keen. However, she lacks their ability to brood convincingly. You can attribute some of it to her tween dialogue, but her delivery generally lacks authenticity.

Nonetheless, this is a horror movie, so one must attribute major points on the scoresheet to creativity in the genre. To that end, the creatures stalking the film’s would-be victims are imaginative. Each is unique and dispatch their target differently. Consequently, the death scenes are surprisingly distinct and impressive. Unfortunately, the longer the film goes on, the more obvious the similarities to Final Destination become. The scripts essentially run parallel to each other with comparable sage characters and plot devices.

It’s regrettable that the film’s skillful demonstrations of ingenuity are overshadowed by a derivative story and miscast lead. But squandering good ideas is becoming a pattern for The Nun director, Corin Hardy.

Director: Corin Hardy
Starring: Dafne Keen, Sophie Nélisse and Percy Hynes White

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