Rent The Lair (2022)

Silly, Poorly Scripted Aliens Derivative - The Lair review by GI

I often wonder who funds or at least is persuaded to fund such awful derivative films like this one. A shameless rip off of Aliens (1986) and with various steals from Predator (1987) chucked in for good measure. The script by couple, director Neil Marshall and star Charlotte Kirk, is all very serious but ultimately laughable and I'm afraid Kirk is really wooden with many of the other actors hamming up their American accents that sound like you're watching a cartoon, the worst offender being Jamie Bamber who has been given an eyepatch to make him more heroic? I think not. So basically a ragbag group of American and British soldiers plus a shot down RAF pilot (Kirk) have to deal with a bunch of nasty alien hybrid creatures in an old Russian laboratory deep in the Afghan desert. There's plenty of gore and some routine firefight set pieces but overall the film is a damp squib with the creatures played by actors in obvious rubber suits. It's a real mess of a film and a shame really because Marshall has made a couple of real gems in The Descent (2005) and Dog Soldiers (2002). Sadly this is nowhere near those in style, originality or direction.