Orphan

Some people have suggested that Orphan, a disposable but not entirely deplorable horror flick from director Jaume Collet-Serra and writers David Johnson and Alex Mace, perpetuates the baseless stigmatization of orphans. So please consider this partial list (from which, I’m warning you, some spoilers may be deduced) of other groups this movie also might offend: alcoholics, women who’ve miscarried, deaf children, nuns, Russians in general and Pyotr Tchaikovsky in particular, dwarfs, hardware suppliers, mental-health workers, Yale University trustees, and those of us who respect and/or want to make out with the actors Peter Sarsgaard and Vera Farmiga—seen here as the adoptive parents of a troublemaking tween (Isabelle Fuhrman) who seems strangely wise beyond her years and psychopathic beyond her means. There is a funny, creepy twist, but as masochistic bad-parent wish fulfillment for the denizens of wintry Connecticut complacency, it’s already scary enough. Still, being a product of that environment myself, I’m almost offended that I’m not offended.