The most magnificent of animals are often found in Royal crests such as lions, eagles and many more. Indeed Prince Andrew has the mythical unicorn on his crest purportedly because he’s never seen and constantly has the horn. But it’s that same mythical creature that is central to ‘Death of a Unicorn’ that sees legal eagle Elliot Kintner (Paul Rudd) driving through the Rockies with his teenage daughter Ridley (Jenna Ortega) to the home of his billionaire client Odell Leopold (Richard E Grant ) in the final stages of terminal cancer and wanting Elliot to finalize the fine print before he signs his will. Elliot and Ridley are still coping with the recent death of his wife / her mother but his pollen allergy gets the better of him as they drive through the mountainous roads and his heavy sneezing sees him take his eyes off the road and mow down an animal that runs out of the forest in front of them. The animal turns out to be a unicorn and as they’re already running late for his client Elliot bludgeons the animal in the first of many blackly comic moments and shove it in the boot of their car.
It’s only when they are at the Leopold’s mountain bound mansion that things take a turn. The unicorns blood has cured Elliott’s pollen allergy and Ridley notices that her acne has cleared up too and it turns out that the unicorn is not dead either and the animals blood appears to have the ability to cure that puts an end to the clients cancer. It’s this second act of the film that sees the social commentary satire take over. Leopold’s family are uniformly awful –Grant’s Odell now sees the creature as a pharmaceutical cash cow rather than a mythical wonder, his wife Belinda ( Tea Leoni) is blind to any good will and their son Shepard (Will Poulter) is the selfish insensitive entitled posh boy wilfully blind to the concerns of others but embracing a new found love for ground unicorn horn as his new narcotic of choice. Added to the mix is their butler Griff ( Anthony Carrigan) doing his best and often failing to suppress his exasperation about his employers actions and between him and Poulter they steal the show. No mean feat when you have Grant, Tea Leoni ( why don’t we see more of her in films) and our own Jessica Hynes ( and she should definitely be featured in far more films) as a personal security guard to the family and all too happy to resort to violence.
It’s the final act that effectively becomes Jurassic Park slasher film as they all flee in terror from the resurrected unicorn’s parents and there’s a whole host of spectacularly gruesome blood spattered deaths. Written and directed by Alex Scharfman, Death of a Unicorn s a load of escapist fun with a really great cast of old school scene stealers (Grant) with their modern day equivalent (Poulter continues to prove that he is a quite brilliant comic actor) alongside upcoming talent ( Ortega proving the polar opposite to Rachel Zegler’s box office poison). Death of a Unicorn is not perfect but its unpredictable plot lurches and often dark humour are part and parcel of the films appeal.
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instagram: When the AGF team went to see ‘Death of a Unicorn’
Here’s the Death of a Unicorn trailer….
