Horrid Henry - The Movie

3D and garish colours seem all the rage these days when it comes to cinema releases. While I personally find 3D rather distracting from the actual film, it’s a blessing as far as Horrid Henry – The Movie is concerned.

Based (loosely I might add) on the popular children books by US author Francesca Simon, this big screen adaptation is a curious hotchpotch of something that tries to by an anarcho comedy for kids. Trust me, any real anarcho kids worth their salt will find most of the pranks too lame, while the film kids’ could learn a trick or two from the old St. Trinian’s movies.

Theo Stevenson’s Horrid Henry doesn’t look much like the mischievous imp from the books’ illustrations; in fact he looks rather wholesome and baby-faced - like a spoilt brat who gets showered with sweets by his gran. That image is precisely what the film’s Henry plays up to, so he can trick his unfortunate ‘victims’ time and time again. Only long-suffering teacher Miss Battle-Axe and her peers know better. So fed up are they with Henry’s constant failure to produce homework, his horrid pranks and aspirations to become a teen rock star (instead of an exemplary pupil), they finally expel him from school. If he thought that’s his lucky day then he was wrong, for Henry is simply send to another school: an all-girl’s school, to make the humiliation perfect. Of course, that doesn’t stop him from getting together with archenemy Moody Margaret (Scarlett Stitt) and the Purple Hand gang to fight scheming headmaster Vic Van Wrinkle (Richard E. Grant). Vic wants to see Henry’s school closed, so parents are forced to send their children to his school instead – making him rich in the process. In an effort to save ‘his’ school from closure and raise the much-needed cash, Henry agrees to go on the ‘To Cool For School’ TV show to win the cash prize, but first he must find a way out of the Bog Of Doom…

Admittedly, the visuals are impressive and so are Anjelica Huston as Miss Battle-Axe and Richard E. Grant as slimy headmaster Vic. With a support cast that includes Parminder Nagra as Miss Lovely, Noel Fielding as glam-goth rocker Ed Banger (merely a cameo appearance), Prunella Scales as Great Aunt Greta and wonderfully exaggerated make-ups, you’d expect this to be a riot beginning to end. Somewhat disappointingly though, the film’s many musical interludes and especially Theo Stevenson’s portrait of Horrid Henry make this a rather flat experience at times, with little Ross Marron as Perfect Peter stealing the show. Thank 3D then for adding some extra dimension to combat flatness!