Whistle: Gnarly kills abound in this knowingly derivative cursed-object horror

As per Stephen Sondheim, Anyone Can Whistle. The premise of Corin Hardy’s high-school-set-horror movie – which premiered on the festival circuit last year – is that they’re better off holding their breath. The ancient Aztec artifact that serves as the movie’s occult MacGuffin has been imbued with a terrible curse: anybody within earshot of its tone as it’s sounded is cursed to die prematurely, albeit by the exact same method that fate was preparing for them anyway. For instance, if it’s already been preordained by a higher power that you’re going to burn to death, the whistle merely expedites the process. Which explains how a junior varsity basketball star can immolate spontaneously (and fatally) in a locker room shower – the first of a half dozen self-consciously gnarly kills are straight out of the Final Destination playbook.

That Hardy wants the viewer to think of other films while watching Whistle is obvious enough; there’s an entire omelette’s worth of Easter Eggs on offer here, including name-checks of A-list B-moviemakers from Cronenberg to Verhoeven. Such allusions are all in good fun, as is the casting of Nick Frost as the nudgingly named “Mr. Craven“, an affable teacher who has just enough screen time to explain the mythical lore behind the titular instrument and dies a horrible death for his troubles. The movie remains in good hands after his exit, however; the choice to angle the proceedings as a tentative queer romance between moody mall-goth Chrys (Dafne Keen) and her stalwart crush Elie (Sophie Nélisse) yields a pair of more-likeable-than-average lead performances and a simple but resonant twist on the sexual politics of mainstream genre fare.  

Such heartening developments aside, Whistle isn’t particularly freaky; the cheesy, chunky CGI does Hardy’s staging no favours. Still, a couple of the set pieces are inventive, including a hit-and-run featuring an invisible car and contained entirely within a suburban bedroom, and a death-by-industrial-grinder episode that takes the accepted subtext of supernatural slasher movies past, present and future – that teenagers are just grist for the proverbial mill – and makes it viciously explicit. The ending, meanwhile, leaves room for a sequel, as it should, or maybe a period-piece prequel set amongst the Aztecs: call it Whistle’s Mother, and send my royalty cheque whenever it’s ready. 

► Whistle is in UK cinemas now.