Spirit Trap

Anything professing to be "this summer's hottest British teen thriller" isn't necessarily telling the whole story. It either falls within the realm of false advertisement or else it is this summer's only British teen thriller.

Perhaps the line was just used to attract the talents of four British up-and-comers who, to be fair, show some promise with an often limp and un-intentionally funny script that sees five college students, including drug-dealing Tom (Mably) and his wild-child girlfriend Adele (Catherwood), enticed to stay in an old North London house with a grisly history.

The fun begins when handy Graphic Design student Nick (Sam Troughton - Alien Vs Predator) removes an old diary from the back of an eerie looking spirit clock - like, you know, a bridge between our world and the next - and the clock begins to tick again, apparently counting down to something but we don't know what.

Jenny (Billie Piper) seems to know more about this sort of thing than anyone else and gives banal explanations about the supernatural timepiece and all other things weird like her very own spirit-catcher and a planchette (a 3-legged sliding device used with Ouija Boards), which just happens to be lying in a drawer.

Before the students can ask questions such as: "who left us messages about this house when the college doesn't even have an accommodation officer?" they start to experience all sorts of paranormal activity usually reserved for the likes of Mulder & Scully.

Only now do they decide to read the journal removed from the inner-working of the clock right at the start of the film and discover secrets about the past owners including forbidden love between a foreign widow and her African servant and the tragic end to their affair...exactly 100 years ago to the day.

Nobody would be brave enough to call this a classic but then it's not a complete waste of time either and fans of teenage pop sensation Billie will no doubt enjoy the experience of seeing their idol on the big screen.

It's easy to enjoy in all honesty, from the mystical and psychic claptrap to the fact that one of the housemates thinks Billie is good-looking... you just have to be able to suspend disbelief.

Dominic Bloch