magnuslhad Scotland is a beautiful country, a staggeringly dramatic landscape that easily lends itself to cinema. Unfortunately, a film requires more than scenery, a point that is lost on the makers of Shell. A young woman lives an isolated life in a stark, barren setting, alone with her taciturn father. The male customers who visit her petrol station desire her. Women are suspicious of her. Shell seems over-attached to her father. What it all means and adds up to is anyone's guess. Films which throw up more questions than answers can be rewarding - such as Under the Skin, which makes better thematic use of a similar landscape. However, there has to be a glimpse of narrative coherence, a hint that more rewards are waiting if we make the effort to see beyond the surface. Sadly, Shell's waters run shallow in the extreme. Chloe Pirrie creates an atmosphere as brooding Shell, but the character does not grow or change. Joseph Mawle as the father evokes no familial bond. Rather than a father battling mental demons, I saw a bewildered actor. And Michael Smiley, so sinister and captivating in Kill List, is badly served by a script that eschews any attempt at character development. This film fails on multiple levels.

tombsoft I recorded this not knowing what it was about, then set down to watch it 3 months later. As the movie progressed, clearly slower than most action movies, my curiosity and expectation turned into a growing sense of awkwardness as the scenes unfolded. A young woman unaware of - or grappling with her own sexuality becomes the focus of male urges in forbidden, fleeting or equally desperate desires. The location of desolate isolation intensifies the storyline of her yearning to break free from her roadside, family-tied prison-without-walls young life, and the pace becomes irrelevant or perhaps magnetizing. Genuine tension fills the air with each customer visit with growing concern of the outcome. This movie is a triumph in awkwardness. Well done Director.

RIK-22 Obviously its very hard to give this massively high marks, as the subject matter is not the most interesting. However I did enjoy it, it is slow paced, but has that knack of using silences to convey much more than dialog can.One thing however is that I didn't see any review getting what I got from the story. I will come straight out with it, for me this was her being rejected by a father who had been molesting her since a young age. It was clear to me that now she was older, she was being rejected by her father. Her mother had perhaps left because of the situation or her leaving caused it.There is a clear scene where a young girl wanders into the place and the mother is worried, as is the daughter, thinking he would go after a young girl again.She has mixed emotions of loving her father as a father, but feeling rejected by father sexual love, so she goes of with some local boy briefly. In the end she is released and can move on.

billcr12 Shell is a seventeen year-old girl living with her father at a gas station in Scotland in the middle of nowhere. He sells old cars for scrap metal, while she pumps gas and cooks and cleans, much as a wife would do. Apparently, her mother headed for greener pastures and left dad and his daughter to fend for themselves. The movie drags on for an hour and a half, with no sense of humor or life to speak of. The almost incestuous overtone is creepy, as is some guy with a BMW who gives Shell a pair of expensive jeans for obvious reasons. The lead actress is very ordinary looking and her father seems to be the unhappiest man on earth. The two combine for an extremely depressing and meaningless drama which I cannot recommend for any reason. The one positive note is the beautiful Scottish countryside.