In an interview with Lionel Shriver' about her highly successful 2005 novel she commented on the difficulty of the project: 'It was admittedly draining. And throughout, I was anxious that because I had never had a child myself, I didn't know what I was talking about and readers who were parents would catch me out.' As adapted for the screen by director Lynne Ramsay and Rory Kinnear this story becomes a terrifyingly realistic exploration of the subject of inherent evil and the manner in which we deal with it. The film is particularly timely as we read almost daily of youngsters killing classmates in schools across the country. But first the story:

Eva Khatchadourian (Tilda Swinton) is trying to piece together her life following the "incident". Once a successful travel writer, she is forced to take whatever job comes her way, which of late is as a clerk in a travel agency. She lives a solitary life as people who know about her situation openly shun her, even to the point of violent actions toward her. She, in turn, fosters that solitary life because of the incident, the aftermath of which has turned her into a meek and scared woman. That incident involved her son Kevin Khatchadourian (Ezra Miller as a teenager and Jasper Newell as a 6 year old and Rock Duer as a toddler), who is now approaching his eighteenth birthday. Eva and Kevin have always had a troubled relationship, even when he was an infant. Whatever troubles he saw, Franklin (John C. Reilly), Eva's complacent husband, just attributed it to Kevin being a typical boy. The incident may be seen by both Kevin and Eva as his ultimate act in defiance against his mother.

Ramsay tells her story in bits and pieces of a collage of moments from the birth of Kevin to his incarceration. For some this kind of non-linear story telling may be disconcerting, but for this viewer it seems like a close examination of the mind of a mother who simply cannot believe she has birthed and is raising a child who is the epitome of evil. The fact that we are aware of something hideous that has happened from the beginning does not get in the way of watching the slow maturation of Kevin - first as a constantly screaming infant to a maliciously bad little boy to a viciously cruel and evil teenager with whom his mother cannot connect except for one very telling instance when she reads the young Kevin 'Robin Hood' and his arrows, at which point Kevin shows a degree of affection for Eva. That moment proves in retrospect to be the nidus for the horror that lies ahead. Yet to say more about the story wound diminish the impact one the viewer. Tilda Swinton is extraordinary in her role as is Ezra Miller. The film. At least, for this viewer, is a powerfully disturbing one and a very fine insight into how evil deeds can happen.

Grady Harp

This movie jumps around in time. Eva Khatchadourian (Tilda Swinton) is a hard-partying drifter in her youth. In the present, she lives a lonely haunted life with a hostile town around her. In between, she marries the permissive Franklin (John C. Reilly) and has a suburban life with two kids. Her first child is the troubled Kevin (Ezra Miller, Jasper Newell). She's not a happy mother and they struggle to get along. Then a troubling incident sends Kevin to prison.

There is a lot of good acting in this. Tilda Swinton is good with her distancing. She shows that she's slightly troubled too. Ezra Miller is cold and scary. The movie doesn't go for the easy emotions. This is a haunted, cold and unsettling story. It's not a fun movie but it is a fascinating watch.

WE NEED TO TALK ABOUT KEVIN is the arty, low-budget film version of a bestselling and slightly controversial book by Lionel Shriver. I knew somebody who's read the book and said it was rubbish and overrated, so my expectations weren't too high for this movie.

I'm glad they weren't. Although there are elements of interest in the undeniably strong story, this is an overrated and, it has to be said, sadly lacking film. The central theme of the story, which is of guilt, is overwrought and overloaded; it's the kind of situation that could be set up in two or three scenes, but instead it's repetitively shoved down our throats for the duration of the entire movie. The director acts like she's fresh out of film school, desperate to show off her understanding of symbolism, like the bloody 'scrubbing paint' imagery which seems to be repeated with a wearying frequency.

The cast is also deeply off-putting. Tilda Swinton is one of those actresses like Cate Blanchett who's incapable of bringing any warmth to her role. Admittedly it works well for some elements of this film's narrative, but it also makes her impossible to sympathise with despite the movie's best efforts; I was actively hoping she'd top herself, as horrible as that sounds. John C. Reilly is badly miscast in a serious role as her husband, although Ezra Miller as the titular character is excellent.

Sadly, this kind of hard-hitting drama needs to be explicit in order to show the devastating consequences of the story build, and Ramsay shies away from showing anything throughout. I know subtlety can be effective, but this film is just too subtle. And the arty way of depicting the story via fragmented flashback is just an annoying distraction.