Dom Butler and Liam Riddler (known as Dom & Liam) have joined McCann London. The multi-award winning creative team had been at Grey London since 2013. While at Grey they worked together as creative leads for WildAid and for clients including Gillette and The Times/Sunday Times. They also contributed to pitch wins for Scope, McVitie’s, Braun, General Mills and Post-it. Awards recognition for Dom & Liam includes two recent Cannes Lions Silvers and a Euro Effies Gold and Silver last year. Liam, while at 303 Mullen Lowe in Australia from 2011-2013, had previously won Gold in the Australian Cannes Young Lions and also took Silver in the global competition. Dom meanwhile picked up a number of his own accolades as a student (D&AD Best New Blood, YCN and One Show), followed by The Drum Print Ad of the Year in 2013….
Aero Film has signed director Dara Bratt, marking the first time she’s joined the roster of a commercial production company. Her credits include the short film In Vivid Detail, the poetic butterfly tale Flutter, shot in Vietnam, and the feature documentary The Singing Abortionist. She also wrote and directed several beauty and lifestyle spots for L’Oreal and Maybelline….
Independent San Francisco creative agency Cutwater has brought Melissa Macarian on board as an art director. She will be working across all of Cutwater’s accounts including Brawny, Peet’s Coffee & Tea, MDsave and American Giant. Prior to Cutwater, Macarian served as an art director for The Brooklyn Brothers where she spearheaded numerous campaigns including the launch of Blink Fitness (an Equinox company). Macarian started her advertising career at Crispin Porter+Bogusky in Miami and eventually relocated to New York where she was a designer at Rosie Labs LLC….
Review: Director James Watkins’ “Speak No Evil”
Quick. Has there ever been a horror film set in a country home with a decent cell signal?
Nope, and there's no signal at Paddy and Ciara's house, either, deep in the English countryside. Soon, that land line will be cut, too, but we're getting ahead of ourselves.
Paddy and Ciara are that fun-but-somewhat-odd British couple whom Louise and Ben, early in "Speak No Evil," meet on their idyllic Tuscan family holiday. Americans based in London, Louise and Ben are at loose ends, with both job and relationship issues. And so, when the new acquaintances write to invite them for a country weekend, they decide to go.
After all, how bad could it be?
Don't answer that. There are many such moments in the first two-thirds of "Speak No Evil," a Hollywood remake of the 2022 Danish film, here starring a deeply menacing James McAvoy. Moments where Louise and Ben, out of mere politeness and social convention, act against their instincts, which tell them something is wrong – very wrong.
Director James Watkins and especially his excellent troupe of actors, adult and children alike, do a nice job of building the tension, slowly but surely. Until all bloody hell breaks loose, of course. And then, in its third act, "Speak No Evil" becomes an entertaining but routine horror flick, with predictable results.
But for a while, it's a way more intelligent film. And the jumpy moments work — I'll confess to literally springing out of my seat when someone uneventfully turned on a power drill.
We begin in stunning Tuscany, where Louise (Mackenzie Davis, in the film's most accessible and empathetic performance) and Ben (Scoot McNairy, all nerves and insecurity) are vacationing with 11-year-old daughter Agnes (Alix West Lefler). At the pool, they... Read More