Metacritic reviews

The Rule of Jenny Pen is a dark and deeply unsettling film. Lithgow is unhinged and Rush is the perfect foil to attempt to bring him down.

True cinema is John Lithgow terrorizing Geoffrey Rush in a nursing home with his creepy hand puppet.

The Rule Of Jenny Pen‘s willingness to constantly challenge its audience with shadows and hints rather than some kind of outright horror mythos is one of its great strengths, and Rush embodies that with intense, compelling control.

While the movie starts off on a pretty straightforward note, one of the things that took me by surprise was just how often I was left guessing how the story was going to play out.

The director remains near-merciless in his approach, never shying away from showing his vulnerable characters (and the tormentor played with twisted relish by Lithgow is, ultimately, as unprotected as any of the others) in states of utter abjection.

The Rule of Jenny Pen has a lot going for it. Lithgow and Rush pull off strong performances, the escalation of tension is well-developed regarding the scenes taken as a whole, and the central conceit of the doll is used to strong effect.

What begins as an atypical use of two beloved actors gets more messy than complex in The Rule of Jenny Pen. And yet, the undaunted director, Ashcroft, approaches his vision with palpable conviction.

It could hit harder, however, were its impact not diluted by the overly long runtime and uneven tone. For a movie that undercuts itself for its own amusement, however, intermittently successful is pretty good.

This psychological thriller about a demonic hand puppet only works in fits and starts. But watching virtuoso actors John Lithgow and Geoffrey Rush let their freak flags fly as nursing home patients in a fight to the death is a blast of fun and fright to make you squirm.

The film single-mindedly sees its elderly characters as objects of disgust or receptacles for harm.